Posted on 11/21/2005 11:02:22 PM PST by Lorianne
AN event that occurred 250 years ago today stands as a singular reminder that the war between faith and science in America did not start in Dover, Pa., where several school board members who promoted the teaching of intelligent design were voted out of office last week, or even in that Tennessee courthouse in 1925 where John Scopes was tried for teaching evolution. It has been a recurring theme in our history since the very seedtime of the republic.
In the early hours of Nov. 18, 1755, the most destructive earthquake ever recorded in the eastern United States struck at Cape Ann, about 30 miles north of Boston. "It continued near four minutes," wrote John Adams, then a recent Harvard graduate staying at his family home in Braintree, Mass. "The house seemed to rock and reel and crack as if it would fall in ruins about us."
The shock was felt as far away as Montreal and Chesapeake Bay. Throughout the New England countryside familiar springs stopped flowing and new ones appeared; stone walls were thrown down and cracks opened in the earth. Two hundred miles out to sea one ship was knocked about so violently that its crew believed it had run aground. In Boston, 100 chimneys toppled into the streets and more than 1,000 houses were damaged. A distiller's new cistern collapsed with such force that it brought down the entire building...
For Bostonians, the experience was unlike anything they had been through and their reactions varied widely. On the one side were a few who absorbed the experience with keen interest; as a natural phenomenon with natural causes. In this group were people like Adams and his favorite Harvard professor, John Winthrop, who gave a lecture on the science of earthquakes the following week.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
So, are you Dumbocrats, or Dhimmicrats? That sounds kinda self-serving, huh? "Evolution", and "elite" are certainly founded on the same philosophies! Sounds like wishfiul thinking, to me...
e·lite or é·lite
1. A group or class of persons or a member of such a group or class, enjoying superior intellectual, social, or economic status: “In addition to notions of social equality there was much emphasis on the role of elites and of heroes within them”
2. The best or most skilled members of a group: the football team's elite.
2. A size of type on a typewriter, equal to 12 characters per linear inch.
Thanks for the ping!
So the choice is between Pat Roberston and the UN.
Thanks for cheering me up, PH. Anyone want to found a space colony?
Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, and Tertullian were certainly brilliant, and rivaled Origen in my estimation. In fact, Tertullian shares Origen's trait of being too brilliant for posterity's sake.. But the sweep and structure of Origen's writing surpassed his predecessors. Keep in mind that Origen was said to have written over a thousand books, many of which are tragically lost to us (due to later, shall we say, 'unbrilliant' theologians).
Augustine, Ambrose, and Athanasius were also brilliant (well, "brilliant" might be too strong a term for Athanasius), but in many ways they were without doubt building on Origen's work. That is why I place Origen above them all. Origen was not strictly orthodox by later standards, but he laid out the rational foundations that were later refined into orthodox doctrine.
As I mentioned above, the others you listed had a millennium or more of theological discourse to draw upon.
The ones that I would consider placing above Origen in terms of brilliance were Tertullian, Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, and John Calvin.
Oh, and Paul of course, but I don't regard the apostles as "theologians" per se. They weren't interpreting the faith; they were establishing it. It is Paul who is being interpreted, not Paul who is interpreting.
PS. Of course a number of others could've made your list, but the exclusion of Basil is particularly egregious!
Thanks. Good stuff.
Augustine
Calvin
Luther
Basil
Ambrose
Aquinas
Jerome
Considering the unfair advantage the others have by this very rough measure, I rest my case! :)
I'll stipulate the claimed brilliance of these authors, and ask a very atheist question - wouldn't these gentlemen, and humanity as a whole, have been better served if they applied their intellects to something other than speculation about the unproved and the ineffable?
Only if we can be certain Pat Robertson and the UN will stay there.
Sign me up.
Basil Rathbone?
Ned Ludd placemarker
Better idea. Much better idea.
As much as I lament all the intellectual firepower that has been wasted (and continues to be wasted) on mythological nonsense, my answer would have to be: definitely not. Their intellects are what established the ethical foundations of Western civilization, in particular the basic notions of human rights and of moral justice that we now take for granted.
Well worth the read. Take the time, click the link, and go for it. :-)
What does Dr. Sagan have to do with this?
Sigh.
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