A few weeks ago, I mentioned reading a new book by Brett Grainger, In the World But Not of It: One Family's Militant Faith and the History of Fundamentalism in America. You don't get too far into it before you realize that the biographical sections don't take place in America. The author is from Ontario. So the subtitle is more about marketing than description. But I'm nitpicking. Although there are a few small things I didn't like about his book, Grainger is a fine writer who sizes up some things very well. Interested? You can listen to a recent National Public Radio interview with Brett Grainger.
John Hobbins is a young biblical scholar with wisdom beyond his years. His special interest is classical Hebrew. But he's a careful student of much more, too. I've become a regular at his blog, Ancient Hebrew Poetry. Check it out.
Every once in a while someone protests in behalf of mainline Protestantism in the U.S. "There are signs of life!" says one. "We're right on the verge of a mainline revival," says another. I don't want to be uncharitable. I just don't believe them. Not for a minute. No, the mainline will continue its long drawn-out decline. To get a glimpse of why, see the post by James H. Charlesworth, biblical scholar extraordinaire who teaches at Princeton Theological Seminary. In "Psalm 23 and the Fear of Stagnant Waters," Charlesworth describes some of his experiences teaching the Bible to future mainline leaders. The reader incompetence generated by rotten attitudes is enough to kill any church.
Showing posts with label Brett Grainger. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Brett Grainger. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
The Culture of the King James Bible
While on vacation, I'm reading In the World But Not of It: One Family's Militant Faith and the History of Fundamentalism in America, by Brett Grainger. It's a blend of memoir and religious history.
Grainger's well-written memories don't exactly match my own. He grew up in a family who were staunch members of the Plymouth Brethren. (These were F. F. Bruce's people. Their eschatology is dispensational premillennialist. Is this why Bruce, a first-rate New Testament scholar and prolific writer, never did a commentary on the Book of Revelation?) Anyway, here's a taste from one of the more memorable passages in Grainger's book:
However lowly they might be in the eyes of the world, the Brethren had one critical advantage: the King James Bible. When believers gathered to share the Word, they left behind the tedium and disappointment of daily life and became heirs of a great cultural legacy. Their imagination was immersed in Scripture. The hero epics of Genesis, the wisdom of Proverbs and Ecclesiastes, the promises of Revelation, the psychology of the Psalms--by turns, hopeful and embittered, imprecatory and magnanimous--lent their hardscrabble lives a beauty and grace they might otherwise have lacked. The Bible compensated for their unpolished manners. It was more important to them than their cheap suits and unfashionable dresses.
When believers spoke with one another, the King James was their lingua franca. They used words long vanished from common speech: yea and nay and verily and whosoever, thee and thou and thine. They called one another brother and sister, as Paul had done in his epistles. Outside in the world, such antiquated habits would have sounded silly or affected. But on Sunday morning, when the plumber with a harelip stood and prayed over bread and wine in seventeenth-century English, it seemed as though he had found his mother tongue.
Grainger's well-written memories don't exactly match my own. He grew up in a family who were staunch members of the Plymouth Brethren. (These were F. F. Bruce's people. Their eschatology is dispensational premillennialist. Is this why Bruce, a first-rate New Testament scholar and prolific writer, never did a commentary on the Book of Revelation?) Anyway, here's a taste from one of the more memorable passages in Grainger's book:
However lowly they might be in the eyes of the world, the Brethren had one critical advantage: the King James Bible. When believers gathered to share the Word, they left behind the tedium and disappointment of daily life and became heirs of a great cultural legacy. Their imagination was immersed in Scripture. The hero epics of Genesis, the wisdom of Proverbs and Ecclesiastes, the promises of Revelation, the psychology of the Psalms--by turns, hopeful and embittered, imprecatory and magnanimous--lent their hardscrabble lives a beauty and grace they might otherwise have lacked. The Bible compensated for their unpolished manners. It was more important to them than their cheap suits and unfashionable dresses.
When believers spoke with one another, the King James was their lingua franca. They used words long vanished from common speech: yea and nay and verily and whosoever, thee and thou and thine. They called one another brother and sister, as Paul had done in his epistles. Outside in the world, such antiquated habits would have sounded silly or affected. But on Sunday morning, when the plumber with a harelip stood and prayed over bread and wine in seventeenth-century English, it seemed as though he had found his mother tongue.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
