Month: August 2013

Index to Wiman’s My Bright Abyss

As I was reading Christian Wiman’s new book My Bright Abyss, I started jotting down the names of poets, theologians, and other writers that he mentioned. My list turned out to be quite extensive—98 names in a 178 page book.

Initially, I suspected that Wiman was drawing heavily, perhaps disproportionately, from contemporary or 20th-century poets. That turned out to be true in some respects, but he also draws from many other eclectic and unexpected sources. One can see from the list a kind of intellectual genealogy for Wiman’s Christian faith.

My stab at a name index can be found here: Wiman index. Feedback and corrections are welcome.

[revised version uploaded October 21, 2013]

In Praise of Robert Alter, Part 2

In November 2009, after reading Alter’s translation of Psalms, I sent the following encouragement to a friend who was wrestling with serious questions of faith and doubt. In it, I quote from a footnote in Alter’s commentary on Psalm 34:

I’ve been thinking a lot about our conversation last Saturday. I just wanted to affirm that the questions you are asking are good ones: candid, defining, essential, humbling.

The struggle to believe, and finding a practice that honors those beliefs, is lifelong, one that is worked out in countless conversations with tradition (“the democracy of the dead,” according to one writer), family, community (which comes and goes), and Scripture.

Continue reading “In Praise of Robert Alter, Part 2” →

In Praise of Robert Alter, Part 1

Screen shot 2013-08-13 at 10.37.31 PM

I have been a unabashed fan of Robert Alter’s translations of the Bible, since his first, Genesis, appeared in 1996, and my admiration has deepened with each new installment. His most recent, Ancient Israel: The Former Prophets, is an expansion of his earlier project, The David Story (1999). Where the earlier book was limited to the life of King David found in 1 and 2 Samuel, the new collection also includes Joshua, Judges, and 1 and 2 Kings, capturing the grand sweep of the historical narratives, hence the title. At 880 pages, it is Alter’s most hefty, and perhaps most intimidating, translation and commentary to date.

Since I don’t know biblical Hebrew, I am not in a position to assess or critique the fidelity of Alter’s translations to the original texts. To be frank, it is not clear to me that James Wood, Michael Dirda, or John Updike are, either. That hasn’t stopped any of them from offering an assessment of Alter’s accomplishments. In that vein, I’d like to offer a few brief observations about the virtues I see in Alter’s work.

Continue reading “In Praise of Robert Alter, Part 1” →

“From a Wandering Nomad . . .”

For the past few months, Christ Church Vienna has been using elements of a Kenyan liturgy in its worship service. One particular section strikes me as an excellent encapsulation of the narrative arc of the Bible in exactly 100 words:

It is right and our delight to give you thanks and praise, Holy Father, living God, supreme over the world, Creator, Provider, Saviour and Giver. From a wandering nomad You created Your family; for a burdened people You raised up a leader; for a confused nation You chose a king; for a rebellious crowd You sent Your prophets. In these last days You have sent us Your Son, Your perfect image, bringing Your kingdom, revealing Your will, dying, rising, reigning, remaking Your people for Yourself. Through Him You have poured out Your Holy Spirit, filling us with light and life.

This passage was drawn from this site, where the entire Kenyan liturgy can be found. (The original Swahili can be found here.) In addition to its remarkable compression, it shows a gradual unfolding of God’s plan in history from His first appearance to a nomad (Abraham) in the burning bush and His faithfulness to an unlikely leader of an exiled people (Moses) to the underdog king of a tiny nation (David) and, ultimately, to Jesus Christ, God’s “perfect image,” who would bear none of the defects or shortcomings of his predecessors.

The wording emphasizes, without qualification or hesitation, the continuity of the divine conspiracy: through Christ, God did not upend His work in, or change the terms of his covenant with, ancient Israel. Rather, He extended His will and continued to reveal Himself in the acts of Jesus’s passion, “remaking [God’s] people for Himself.”

What a powerful restatement of the Christian view of history, of God’s everlasting kindness to His people! Amen.