I am currently reading Tradition and Apocalypse and am highly intrigued by the promised upcoming articles on eschatology. It seems to me that the entire New Testament (not just Revelation) is apocalyptic in orientation, with the assumption that the beginning of the coming age (aion) will soon (within a generation) be coming to pass. Learning to read the New Testament in a historically situated eschatology helped me to see its implicit (and sometimes rather explicit) universalist themes.
I am thoroughly enjoying the book so far. That being said, I enjoy your discussions of literature and your own fiction most of all and check daily for more installments of your recommendations. I do hope you will consider adding in with the obscure some thoughts on more known authors and favorite works. Thoughts on Sebald, Joyce, Pynchon, and your BFF Proust? Maybe?
I’m definitely not complaining about your productive and constant output!
Really anticipating your forthcoming essays on eschatology! I finally read the book of Revelation for the first time—from your translation—and it’s quite a baffling and phantasmagoric book. More so than Ezekiel or Daniel.
downloaded the Kindle version, I am starting to get a tad more comfortable with notes and highlighting in the kindle, but after 40 plus years of real books the transition has not been easy, but where elese can you carry around three or four hundred books in your pocket
Are you the reader of the audiobook? You'd be superb, of course; but preparing a professional quality audiobook is, I assume, sufficiently time-consuming that I'd regretfully understand if readers were forced to listen to your words in the tones of George Clooney, Anthony Hopkins, or Phoebe Waller-Bridge.
I want to share with you and your readers an unexpected find on YouTube -- a three day conference on Sergii Bulgakov. This is a link to the first day; the first talk begins at about 52.30 or so. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-3grnK6E00
I'm just starting Chapter 3 of Tradition and Apocalypse, and thus far it resonates deeply. As an historian I've always been puzzled, especially, at how Catholicism's clearly historically contingent accrual of its thousand points of dogma can be seen as the infallible revelation of what was always already inherent in basic message of the Gospel and as the *required* beliefs for salvation. I'm intrigued to see how you ultimately work out the problem of tradition.
I confess I know basically nothing about the Catholic writers you're engaging with in Tradition and Apocalypse. I just take a perverse delight in their destruction.
I just ordered this. I'm very excited, especially because the next time I'm preaching is May 15 and that's Revelation 21:1-5 (and also John 13:31-35, if you think I can fold that into the same apocalyptic theme). What do you think?
Looking forward to this one. I particularly love your treatment of ‘(T)radition’ in the second part of Chapter 7 in ‘Theological Territories’. Indeed I quote endlessly sections from chapter 7 to family, friends and fellow parishioners.
I haven't read the book yet (I ordered my copy yesterday), but I have read and listened to some discussions (by you and others) of its contents.
Off the cuff observation: Your proposal for (what might be called) the 'perspective of tradition' seems to be consonant with (your description of) JPII's 'perspective on the body.'
“Life in the Spirit,” the most impressive of the texts collected in the Theology of the Body, is to a large extent an attempt to descry the true form of man by looking to the end towards which he is called, so that the glory of his eschatological horizon, so to speak, might cast its radiance back upon the life he lives in via here below.
Perhaps it could be said that all truly Christian thought and practice has this form or 'perspective.'
RE: book recommendations - I could use one regarding Orthodox reading of the New Testament. I'm increasingly aware (from your writings and other sources) just how much the translation of the NT into Latin distorted its interpretation within the church in the West, creating irreconcilable dichotomies (e.g., grace vs. works, predestination vs. free will). Is there a decent study Bible or series of commentaries that would help me understand how the NT has been read within Orthodoxy, apart from this history of catastrophic Latin-mediated misreading? I have (of course) read your translation and explanatory notes, which helps considerably. Now I'm wondering where to turn for a greater understanding specifically of how the various passages have been approached in the Orthodox tradition. Thoughts, both from David and other readers here?
I am currently reading Tradition and Apocalypse and am highly intrigued by the promised upcoming articles on eschatology. It seems to me that the entire New Testament (not just Revelation) is apocalyptic in orientation, with the assumption that the beginning of the coming age (aion) will soon (within a generation) be coming to pass. Learning to read the New Testament in a historically situated eschatology helped me to see its implicit (and sometimes rather explicit) universalist themes.
I am thoroughly enjoying the book so far. That being said, I enjoy your discussions of literature and your own fiction most of all and check daily for more installments of your recommendations. I do hope you will consider adding in with the obscure some thoughts on more known authors and favorite works. Thoughts on Sebald, Joyce, Pynchon, and your BFF Proust? Maybe?
I’m definitely not complaining about your productive and constant output!
Really anticipating your forthcoming essays on eschatology! I finally read the book of Revelation for the first time—from your translation—and it’s quite a baffling and phantasmagoric book. More so than Ezekiel or Daniel.
downloaded the Kindle version, I am starting to get a tad more comfortable with notes and highlighting in the kindle, but after 40 plus years of real books the transition has not been easy, but where elese can you carry around three or four hundred books in your pocket
Are you the reader of the audiobook? You'd be superb, of course; but preparing a professional quality audiobook is, I assume, sufficiently time-consuming that I'd regretfully understand if readers were forced to listen to your words in the tones of George Clooney, Anthony Hopkins, or Phoebe Waller-Bridge.
I want to share with you and your readers an unexpected find on YouTube -- a three day conference on Sergii Bulgakov. This is a link to the first day; the first talk begins at about 52.30 or so. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-3grnK6E00
The abstracts are available here: https://www.unifr.ch/sergij-bulgakov/de/assets/public/files/Forschung/2021%20Konferenz/Abstracts_new.pdf
I have been unable to find the conference proceedings.
I'm just starting Chapter 3 of Tradition and Apocalypse, and thus far it resonates deeply. As an historian I've always been puzzled, especially, at how Catholicism's clearly historically contingent accrual of its thousand points of dogma can be seen as the infallible revelation of what was always already inherent in basic message of the Gospel and as the *required* beliefs for salvation. I'm intrigued to see how you ultimately work out the problem of tradition.
I confess I know basically nothing about the Catholic writers you're engaging with in Tradition and Apocalypse. I just take a perverse delight in their destruction.
I just ordered this. I'm very excited, especially because the next time I'm preaching is May 15 and that's Revelation 21:1-5 (and also John 13:31-35, if you think I can fold that into the same apocalyptic theme). What do you think?
It's a really splendid book.
Looking forward to this one. I particularly love your treatment of ‘(T)radition’ in the second part of Chapter 7 in ‘Theological Territories’. Indeed I quote endlessly sections from chapter 7 to family, friends and fellow parishioners.
One can only hope that your articles on NT eschatology will include copious charts, graphs, and salacious predictions.
I haven't read the book yet (I ordered my copy yesterday), but I have read and listened to some discussions (by you and others) of its contents.
Off the cuff observation: Your proposal for (what might be called) the 'perspective of tradition' seems to be consonant with (your description of) JPII's 'perspective on the body.'
“Life in the Spirit,” the most impressive of the texts collected in the Theology of the Body, is to a large extent an attempt to descry the true form of man by looking to the end towards which he is called, so that the glory of his eschatological horizon, so to speak, might cast its radiance back upon the life he lives in via here below.
Perhaps it could be said that all truly Christian thought and practice has this form or 'perspective.'
I have just finished “Tradition and Apocalypse “. Words fail me. It is an extraordinary and most timely gift to us all. Thank you, David.
RE: book recommendations - I could use one regarding Orthodox reading of the New Testament. I'm increasingly aware (from your writings and other sources) just how much the translation of the NT into Latin distorted its interpretation within the church in the West, creating irreconcilable dichotomies (e.g., grace vs. works, predestination vs. free will). Is there a decent study Bible or series of commentaries that would help me understand how the NT has been read within Orthodoxy, apart from this history of catastrophic Latin-mediated misreading? I have (of course) read your translation and explanatory notes, which helps considerably. Now I'm wondering where to turn for a greater understanding specifically of how the various passages have been approached in the Orthodox tradition. Thoughts, both from David and other readers here?