Review: Outliers: The Story of Success
Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell My rating: 4 of 5 stars Thoroughly enjoyed this easy read. Gladwell does have quite the knack for finding interesting stories and weaving them into a narrative supporting his thesis. I particularly enjoyed the illustration from Gladwell's parents' life. The excerpt from his mother's book about being forced to confront her own racism and forgive someone else's—that was very powerful. If Gladwell is right that cultural legacies shape us—for good...
An Illustration I Hope to Use Often to Elucidate Redemptive-Historical/Biblical-Theological Reading of Scripture
In the summer of 2006 I went on a mission team with a choir of 25 other young people (one of whom I decided to keep). We went to numerous cities in Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Poland, and Lithuania. I often drove one of the four vehicles in our caravan, but I was never the navigator. I just followed the leader. So at the end of the summer I could remember lots of individual places, but I had no idea of their relationship to one another within their respective countries—especially in Germany,...
A.O. Scott and David Carr of the New York Times Argue Eloquently and Wittily About the Objectivity of Truth and Beauty When it Comes, in Particular, to Movie Reviews
Plato argued about whether beauty hews to any objective standard. We’re still at it. I’m on your side, A.O. I value your reviews because they insightfully lay bare what a movie is saying, helping me understand my culture without having to wallow in it. You grope after an objective standard, unwilling to say what it is but unwilling to deny that it exists.
NASB Less Literal
Comparing Bible translations is a very complex matter. One small example: The New American Standard Bible is generally (and, I think, rightly) considered to be the most “literal” of major English Bible translations. (“Literal” is a notoriously tricky word that I won’t try to define here.) But check out the following verse in major Bible translations: ESV Col 3:5 Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is...
An Approximately 25-Year-Old Misunderstanding with 400-Year-Old Roots
Today I’m writing about the funny, interesting, and powerful story of Elijah for eighth graders. And just now—just now, after 25 years of being a Bible reader—I realized what the King James translators meant when they have Elijah say, “How long halt ye between two opinions?” (1 Kings 18:21). I always assumed that "stopping" between two opinions was what they meant (careful statistical analysis of my wife's opinion revealed 100% agreement). People in the olden days used to say "Halt!" when they...