It would have been helpful if Richard Mitchell had written his own Divine Comedy, so that we could usefully employ the taxonomy of the various circles of illiteracy he could have described. And we could, in this life, work and hope to make it to purgatory.

Men can be heroic in defense of their errors.

As a group I member, the apostasy has resulted in my backslidden mind. I desire to think deeply, seeing beyond symptoms to the germ--to the germ carrier--to...

God help us! These feeble thoughts emerge from me...and I am trying! What of those who are not, will not, never will?

I think (I hope) we can all arrive at that point of frustration. It is not a comfortable place to be, but it is the necessary first step. I must believe our circumstance is—at the human level—hopeless. I am persuaded that we will never get back what we threw away. Now we will learn the hard way why we should have saved it.

There are some small mitigations:

The greatest is a learned humility. We are certainly justified in shedding our notions of competence, and God can use the desperate. Now we can read the letter to the Laodiceans with open eyes.

Second, once we grasp the severity of our situation, we can at least correct our perceptions. When you’ve been flooded from your home, you begin to see your sharp knife, your flashlight, your length of rope, your dry matches and your blanket in an entirely different light.

Third, “First, do no harm” is not in the Hippocratic Oath, but it is still excellent advice. There are those understandably irritated by my hostile attitude towards half-way measures, whether we find them in Majesty Hymns, feckless calls to seriousness, or remedies based on cornpone notions about making melody dominant in our music or . . . you name it. But I persist in the belief that some sort of distinction will be necessary for all of us to make—each according to his lights—so we can stop the bleeding.

The good is the enemy of the best and the bad is just dreadful. As a practical matter, we will be forced to reconsider our relationship with those who think their good intention is sufficient qualification for leadership.

I should like to hope that in the grand march of the church through history, the last tattered and beggarly few will still possess enough wisdom so as not to embarrass the Prophets, Apostles and Martyrs whom we’ve already snubbed.

I'm group I. I am at that point of frustration. I'm amazed at the consistent nature of my own church's music selections. 1 good hymn (from the first 20 pages of the hymnal). 1 chorus that I don't understand musically because I've never heard it and it isn't easy to know and we don't display the music for it - perhaps since I'm not lost I don't understand it? I think it is meant to win the lost! Then there are 2 Fanny Crosby tunes, sang far too slowly, and then the closing fanny crosby wannabe tune to make us feel bad about not wanting to win the lost. The past 4 weeks it has been the same.

Question - Dissidens, you mentioned awhile back that you were consider taking up some leadership in the area of music at your church...what was the dilema? If it would even be worth it? To be put in that place, and then promptly removed because you want to get rid of the ol' favorites. This is what I'm mulling over right now for myself. I'm praying that my church will have changed enough by the time I have kids. I want to start planting the grass to feed the sheep so I can make a coat, but from the responses I've receive from a few, it isn't going to be easy - maybe not possible. We'll see. I suppose my situation is little different than everyone else's. Definitely not as bad as some.

Well, there was a problem but there was no dilemma. The membership of a local church had been giving a non-committal acquiescence to a belief about worship which, when it felt was in a less dependent state of affairs, felt free to jettison. This I had known for years. I was only in a position of informal leadership, did not have the authority of a pastor, and the fissures in the church merely broke the surface. I knew they were there, but was never in a position to force the issue. This particular church resolved the problem with a split down the middle.

“Never welcome, but always anticipated.”

But I say all that to address that part of your question. That’s not my concern here.

The problems that concern me more are two: one is churches—more healthy in some respects—but still incapable of seeing (or unwilling to confront) the importance of this issue, and the second is the serious bind that that puts Class I people in.

(I didn’t classify the people in this discussion for the purpose of ranking them in any way, and I certainly am not expecting anyone to declare himself out of any sense of loyalty or identification with the blog or in support of an idea. People here are certainly welcome to disagree with me—or with the idea—and continue as equals.)

I tried to distinguish among the normal reactions to this idea only because I believe that will determine one’s “solution”, or, as I think is the case, since there is no solution, one’s course of action.

As with most conflicts, the majority is in the middle and those on the extremes seek to swing it to their side. That’s just politics, but that’s the politics you will be dealing with. People in Class II and III are not about to effect change: they either like the status quo or don’t mind it. I address those in Class I because they were the ones who expressed profound frustration and wondered about how to proceed.

In particular, the point of this post (and my comment to Lewis) was to introduce the idea that the nature of the conflict is such that you may find yourself at odds with those who claim to desire the good. Indeed the results of their actions have been to aggravate the situation while at the same time leading many to believe they are on the right side of the issue. People who like Majesty Hymns are not likely to be sensitive to the frustrations expressed here in Remonstrans comments.

Imagine a natural disaster. Someone has set up triage: a few incompetent but eager people feel they are helping by directing medical personnel to the wrong places, people with superficial wounds are getting an IV drip, and people who need immediate attention are just lying ignored, dehydrating in the hot sun.

If you grasp the importance of the problem you must address the nature of the solution some are offering. Some of those who are in school will one day be confronting pulpit committees. I cannot tell anyone what questions to ask, that would be obviously foolish. What I can perhaps do is suggest the sort of circumstance I have witnessed in order to help them consider what will be rational possibilities, plausible results, rather than merely assume that the standard answers they get to their questions reflect the real state of affairs.

Dissidens, "the astoundingly simplistic equation of high culture with Nazism." If someone did equate the two, that is simple minded. But if that is meant to be a summary of what I said about Nazism contradicting the humanizing effect of high culture, it is inaccurate. There is no equation involved. The effect is what we are talking about. And the effects of high culture can go either way.
I am in category 1, too. Agreement and disagreement.

Dear Dissidens,

As kamelda's comment above states, her earlier post in that other thread did not "equat[e] high culture with nazism". Not at all. Not remotely. Her actual comment was this:

"The supposed humanizing influence of high culture is flatly contradicted by the Nazis. These men could debauch themselves in the most heinous inhumanity all day long; then retire to spend the rest of the evening enjoying the life-changing music of Schubert. They had denied beauty, because they had denied God. This ought to teach us the folly of talking about the life changing power of any composer or aesthetic tradition-- of looking to culture for the offices of Christ. The symbols cannot save us, and we emasculate beauty with such inordinate desires."

http://remonstrans.net/index.php/2005/08/30/beauty_is_not_skin_deep#c986

She thought (and I agree) that your post and your subsequent comments thereto overstate the power of beautiful music (or "high culture" generally) to sanctify; and to demonstrate its severe limits she cited the Nazis as people devoted to high culture but thoroughly devoted to UN-sanctity.

Similarly, you distort several other of the "arguments between the asterisks". But let's just stick with the Nazi one. Tsk-tsk.

Dissidens:

Does the worship of spirit and of truth you are calling us back to have anything to do with rectitude in our speaking?

It would seem that all you have been talking about is the quality of a performance.

No.

I do not speak at all of worship of spirit or of truth, I speak of worship of God in spirit and in truth.

Again, in my illustrative blasphemy, in my citation of (and from) Majesty Hymns and in my references to the substance of Evangelical worship, I have been speaking primarily about content and meaning.

But since you bring up “quality of performance”, Yes, that would also be included.

I listen to Sara Mingardo sing O selger Tag and Dawn Upshaw sing Mein Herze schwimmt im Blut and I hear excellence that I will never hear in church. Ever.

It is not in “your people” to do it.

They could not do it if they wanted to. And indeed, they do not want to.

It takes a lifetime of work to be able to do it; Evangelicals don’t even make the effort.

And I do not cite these (Mingardo/Upshaw) as examples of what your worship should be. That is the conclusion you leap to in order to evade the issue. Feel free to dismiss me any way you like, but try to be honest with our readers. I am not citing these people with hopes that Evangelicals will begin to sound like them; I do it to show the chasm that exists between serious musicians who understand Bach and religious people who merely claim to be serious about worship but who continue to indulge in the sort of Lawrence Welk/Garrison Keillor amusements they have developed a deep affection for.

The difference between the work these two classes of people produce says something that the earnest Christian must reflect on. With Evangelicals, activity equals improvement, talk equals reform.

It ain’t workin’.

I realize we (you and I) are not connecting. But I determined in my own youth that I will not let other people suffer alone in their frustrations thinking it is somehow a fault of their own that they see excellence in the concert hall and indifference in the sanctuary, or that when they see it they can dismiss it as insignificant.

You can take some comfort in the fact that I (and my fellow-sufferers) will probably never effect a change in the status quo. What you cannot do is pretend that this difference is imaginary.

Dissidens, thank you for your reply.

The excellency of John Eliot Gardiner does show the poverty of Ron Hamilton. I am in perfect agreement as far as that goes. But I object when worship is discussed as if it could be summarized in terms of whether we listen to John Eliot Gardiner or Ron Hamilton. And I strongly object if rectitude and mercy are put to the side, while we talk about the matter.

I have no hidden agenda of misrepresnting you. I will be happy to have misunderstood. But I believe that you are easily misunderstood in that way because most of your discussion on this blog about worship (and how to fix it) centers around musical performance. This while you can be unjust in order to make those who oppose some of your ideas seem petty and ridiculous. For instance, you have no idea who "my people" are, or what they could do a decent job with. I assume you refer to the people who are not "your" people. I never claimed them. I merely pointed out that they were God's, and that this objective relation is presumably more important than yours (or mine, or anybody else's). Yet this most important fact is never mentioned about these people.

I understand your frustration about the quality in Dawn Upshaw, as opposed to the quality of how most of us entertain ourselves in church. If I didn't, I wouldn't be here. From the beginning, God has required our best: and our best is better than Dawn Upshaw. The fruit of the earth, however beautiful and elsewhere appropriate, had no place on the altar. Because there was something even more beautiful to go there. And it was covered in blood, which was not very pretty. I asked you on another thread what you do with all this paradox. You never answered. And you never express the paradox. And however much I agree that our worship lacks quality, I cannot get around the paradox that the quality required is often in at least apparent opposition to the quality we want to give.

I think you could have more impact for good if you were more accurate. Why should I take comfort if you will do neither?

I apologize if I have misunderstood you, with regard to worship. I would like to hear you address it sometime, without referencing musical performance-- or at least with more clarity about the purpose for which you are doing so. It would help me to understand better.

Well, a couple of things:

By calling them “your people” I was only trying to restate what I said earlier. They are not my people. You seemed to say that their claim to be God’s people makes them my people; it does not. So, I figure if you make that claim for them, then that would make them your people ipso facto.

Lots of people claim to be God’s people, I simply don’t recognize their claim. The Pharisees claimed to be God’s people in the very act of blaspheming his name.

As for why I ignored your earlier question, I simply disagreed with it entirely. The only response I could muster would be to argue with you. I chose not to.

Yes. But the cross is aesthetically offensive. And the cross is the most forcible expression of holiness we have. It's not just the quantity, but the quality of beauty that goes way beyond the surface.

I do not find the cross aesthetically offensive any more than I find a painting of an ugly woman aesthetically offensive. And the only meaning I draw from the historical event is one of profound beauty. And I do not see the cross as “the most forcible expression of holiness we have”. I view Golgotha and see holiness nowhere. It is a hideous collection of reprobates committing an obscene crime, and the only righteous person has had the sins of mankind placed on him. It is a scene of love and death, not holiness.

You expect from me an explanation of a paradox I don’t even see.

Mercy is fine in its place, but mercy is not indifference. This would be an entirely different discussion if there were a recognition of the apostasy and an attempt to amend our ways. That is not where the church is.

An observation about your argument from quality. Beethoven could visit brothels and produce Beethoven. A high quality composition or performance does not necessarily argue anything about the quality of one's worship. Whether we are worshipping aright has to be ascertained (and ultimately dealt with) on other grounds.

Low quality performances are always and everywhere low quality, which is an argument against them as being wrong already. But the state of the performer's heart may be just as good as the state of a person's heart playing Vivaldi. It might be better. All of our worship is corrupt.

I am afraid to fix too much on one manifestion of corruption, lest I overlook the stench of my own. If my heart is lifted up in me, it is not right before Him.

I had been thinking about what you said previously, so my observation was posted before I had seen your reply.

"Mercy is fine its place." This makes it sound like mercy is fine for some things, but not for others. But the place of mercy is infinite: there is no aspect of our lives or characters that are to be divorced from. We abuse it because we do not understand it. You are right that indifference is no part of it.

So you find the crucifixation process aesthetically pleasing? You think it beautiful that people were killed in this way?

God's righteousness was declared in the crucifixion of Christ "Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus." In the cross, we have the forceful meeting of mercy and truth. It is the most resounding kiss of righteousness and peace. It is a scene of Love and Justice.

Do you believe in the atonement? The cross is our holiness before God, and His holiness in accepting us. I am not referring to a trinket we can wear around our necks, or some symbol we put at Easter wrapped in purple. I am referring to the brutal murder of God, by which He triumphed over death and murder.

The hideous collection of reprobates were acting, though they did not know it, according to the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God. And that too, is God's holiness.

According to my theology Christ's blood pleads for me, not the cross. Man built the cross to kill other men, it sanctifies nothing. Man had no part in effecting his redemption, not even by building a cross.

Dissidens, the cross of Christ has always stood as a symbol of redemption and all that redemption entails, throughout church history. Below are some statements regarding what the church has always seen in the cross.

I have been thinking more about what you said. I had also asked, concerning the paradoxical nature of beauty and "high" culture, what you do with Paul's distinction about the more excellent way? He made this distinction in the context of corporate worship.

You said of the cross that you "I view Golgotha and see holiness nowhere.... It is a scene of love and death, not holiness." Leaving aside what I said in my previous reply and all that is said below, this distinction of love and holiness answers that question. It answers all my questions, and accounts for everything. Perhaps in reading Charles Williams' The Greater Trumps you came across Sybil's reaction to a similar statement:

"Sanctity!" Mr Coningsby uttered derisively. "Nancy's not very near sanctity."
"My dear, she's in love," his sister exclaimed.
"And what's that got to do with sanctity?" Mr. Coningsby asked triumphantly, and enjoyed the silence to which Sybil sometimes found herself driven. Anyone who didn't realize the necessary connection between love and sanctity left her incapable of explanations.

It is easy to write people off by claiming that they are writing you off. I hope you will not do that. I have taken the trouble to interact with your ideas, and provide reasons for my disagreement.

As to your aesthetic view of the cross-- I think this is what comes of using symbols in our churches: we dissociate them from what they actually are: we strip them out of all reality. We forget the wild unsqueamishness of a God who would actually allow His Son to be nailed naked to such a thing; His little weak-kneed children to be nailed to it upside down. We Victorianise the atonement out of all significance but a sickly perversion of love that has nothing to do with holiness, and "death", as if "death" were not the rasping, scorching, spectacle that pierced Mary's heart, but was something still and beautiful and altogether appropriate for the foyer. The cross is not a trinket. It is not a decoration. It is not a painting by Michelangelo. If you can possibly think so, then on behalf of the early Christians I recommend you to an aesthetic pair of thumbscrews.

I will be happy to have wrong about any of this. But I can only take you at your words.

Thank you for the discussion.

Suffering-
Ignatius: "And let no one, of things visible or invisible, envy me that I should attain to Jesus Christ. Let fire and the cross; let crowds of wild beasts; let tearings, breakings, and dislocations of bones; let cutting off of members; let shatterings of the whole body; and let all the dreadful torments of the devil come upon me: only let me attain to Jesus Christ."

Justin: "And that lamb which was commanded to be wholly roasted was a symbol of the suffering of the cross which Christ would forego."

Shame-
Justin: "And you yourselves, if you will confess the truth, must acknowledge that we, who have been called by God through the despised and shameful mystery of the cross...."

The Curse-
Justin: "Then Trypho remarked, 'Be assured that all our nation waits for Christ, and we admit that all the Scriptures which you have quoted refer to Him. Moreover, I do also admit that the name of Jesus, by which the son of Nave (Nun) was called, has inclined me very strongly to adopt this view. But whether Christ should be so shamefully crucifed, this we are in doubt about. For whosoever is crucified is said in the law to be accursed, so that I am exceedingly incredulous on this point. It is quite clear, indeed, that the Scriptures announce that Christ had to suffer; but we wish to learn if you can prove it to us whether it was by the suffering cursed in the law.'
"I replied to him, 'If Christ was not to suffer, and the prophets had not foretold that He would be led to death on account of the sins of the people, and be dishonored and scourged, and reckoned among the transgressors, and as a sheep to be led to the slaughter, whose generation, the prophet says, no man can declare, then you would have good cause to wonder...."

The Wrath of God-
Augustine: "Since men were in this state of wrath through original sin-- a condition made still graver and worse and more pernicious as they compounded more and worse sins with it-- a Mediator was required; that is to say, a Reconciler who by offering a unique sacrifice, of which all the sacrifices of the Law and the Prophets were shadows, should allay that wrath."

Mystery-
Justin: "Jacob served Laban for speckled and many-spotted sheep; and Christ served, even to the slavery of the cross, for the various and many-formed raced of mankind, acquiring them by the blood and mystery of the cross."
(Ephesians 3)

The Power of God-
Ignatius: "For the prince of this world rejoiceth when anyone denies the cross, since he knows that the confession of the cross is his own destruction. For that is the trophy which has been raised up against his power...."

Justin: "But in no instance, not even in any of those called sons of Jupiter, did they imitate the being crucified; for it was not understood by them, all the things said of it having been put symbolically. And this, as the prophet foretold, is the greatest symbol of His power and role...."

Destruction of Satan-
Ignatius: "And indeed, before the cross was erected, he (Satan) was eager that it should be so; and he 'wrought in the children of disobedience.' ... But when it was just about to be erected, he was troubled... because he perceived his own destruction. The cross of Christ was the beginning of his condemnation, the beginning of his death, the beginning of his destruction.

Our Sins, and Forgiveness of Sins-
Justin: "By that which took place in running water, in which the wood and the hyssop and the scarlet were dipped, is set forth the bloody passion of Christ on the cross for the salvation of those who are sprinkled with the Spirit, and the water, and the blood. Wherefore the material for purification was not provided chiefly with reference to leprosy, but with regard to the forgiveness of sins, that both leprosy might be understood to be an emblem of sin, and the things which were sacrificed an emblem of Him who was to be sacrificed for sins."

Augustine: "The death of Christ crucified is no other than the likeness of the forgiveness of sins."

The Obedience of Christ, Our Obedience-
Irenaeus: "And not by the aforesaid things alone has the Lord manifested Himself, but also by means of His passion. For doing away with that disobedience of man which had taken place at the beginning by the occasion of a tree, 'He became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross,' rectifying that disobedience which had occurred by reason of a tree, through that obedience which was upon the tree... by which things He clearly shows forth God Himself, whom we had offended in the first Adam. By the second Adam, however, we are reconciled, being made obedient unto death."

Our Justification-
Ignatius: "My authentic archives are His cross, and death, and the faith which bears on these things, by which I desire, through your prayers, to be justified."

Our Peace and Hope-
Ignatius: "Ignatius, who is called Theophorus to the holy church.... possessing peace through the flesh and spirit of Jesus Christ, who is our hope, in His passion by the cross and death...."

The Character of God-
Irenaeus: "And from this fact, He exclaimed upon the cross, 'Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do,' the long-suffering, patience, compassion, and goodness of Christ are exhibited."
(Romans 1:16,17; Romans 3:25,26, Romans 5:18-21 with regard to righteousness)
The Wisdom of God-
Irenaeus: "And for this reason, indeed, when at this present time the law is read to the Jews, it is like a fable; for they do not possess the explanation of all things pertaining to the advent of the Son of God, which took place in human nature; but when it is read by Christians, it is a treasure, hid indeed in a field, but brought to light by the cross of Christ..."

Irenaeus again: "True knowledge, then, consists in the understanding of Christ, which Paul terms the wisdom of God hidden in a mystery, which 'the natural man receiveth not,' the doctrine of the cross, of which if any man 'taste', he will not accede to the disputations and quibbles of proud and puffed up men, who go into matters of which they have no perception. For the truth is unsophisticated [here there is a Greek word I can only transliterate aschematistos]...."

Dissidens: Your comment included the statement that "the cross ... sanctifies nothing". I have to hope you're just blowing smoke to annoy Kamelda. Neither the Bible nor Christian discourse reflects the distinction you now purport to insist on between the cross on the one hand and Jesus' death thereon on the other hand. Rather, it's expressly Biblical to say that the CROSS has "effect" ("power") (1 Cor. 1:17); to call the Gospel "the preaching of the CROSS" (1:18); to say that persecution of Christians is "for the CROSS" (Gal 6:12); to "glory ... in the CROSS" (6:14); to say that we are "reconcile[d] ... unto God ... by the CROSS" (Eph 2:16); and to call our opponents the "enemies of the CROSS" (Php 3:18).

Coincidentally, I received an e-mail this morning from an Eastern Orthodox friend saying that yesterday the Orthodox (the New Calendar ones, anyway) observed the "Universal Exaltation of the Precious and Life-Giving Cross". The prayers from the Great Vespers service include these words:

"The Cross is raised on high, and urges all the creation to sing the praises of the undefiled Passion of Him who was lifted high upon it. For there it was that He killed our slayer, and brought the dead to life again: and in His exceeding goodness and compassion, He made us beautiful and counted us worthy to be citizens of heaven. Therefore with rejoicing let us exalt His Name and magnify His surpassing condescension.

"Come, all ye peoples, let us venerate the blessed Wood, through which the eternal justice has been brought to pass. For he who by a tree deceived our forefather Adam, is by the Cross himself deceived; and he who by tyranny gained possession of the creature endowed by God with royal dignity, is overthrown in headlong fall. By the blood of God the poison of the serpent is washed away; and the curse of just condemnation is loosed by the unjust punishment inflicted on the Just... Glory be to Thee, O Christ our King, for Thy dread dispensation towards us, whereby Thou hast saved us all, for Thou art good and lovest mankind.

"... Today is the Cross exalted and devils are put to flight; today the whole creation is set free from corruption: for through the Cross every gift of grace has shone upon us. Therefore all of us rejoicing fall before Thee, saying: How marvelous are Thy works, O Lord: glory to Thee!

"Today, O Christ our God, we sinners venerate with unworthy lips Thy precious Cross .... We cry aloud to Thee that wast pleased to be crucified upon it: O Lord, with the thief count us worthy of Thy Kingdom."

The Eastern Orthodox may be a bit more florid on the point than us Protestants, but even we sing such songs as "In the cross of Christ I glory, / Tow'ring o'er the wrecks of time" and "Beneath the Cross of Jesus, I fain would take my stand / ... My glory all the cross".

Surely this is not alien to your own spirituality.

I want to thank you and kamelda for staying on top of this. It shows you’ve been half-way paying attention, and I’m happy to give partial credit.

Regrettably, you fail to make a persuasive rebuttal. Of course I agree with those people you and kamelda cite on the significance of the cross.

I think if both of you read closely, though, you will see that in many of your examples (as well as thousands of others), “the cross” is a synecdoche for not only the trial and crucifixion of Jesus but also a sinless life, without which the crucifixion, while a grand gesture, would have been soteriologically inadequate. And while you quote many reliable thinkers, I would also cite Hebrews 9:14 and I Peter 1:19. Perhaps you both can see how my point remains. It is the blood, not the cross, of Christ that effects my redemption. The cross was merely the occasion of the shed blood.

Personally I often find it helpful to understand the answer in the context of the question. I was asked:

“So you find the crucifixation [sic] process aesthetically pleasing?”

I do, in fact, find Jesus’ crucifixion a beautiful thing. As I said, its beauty lies in its meaning.

That whole question, by the way, seems to have lost its context as well: we began by talking about whether or not “the cross is the most forcible expression of holiness we have.” I said I fail to see holiness on Golgotha.

I looked again and I still don’t see it. I see no holiness until the following Sunday.

Dissidens:

As I thought, you were just trying to split hairs to score debating points against Kamelda, since you do in fact acknowledge the place of the cross in Christian expression after all. Yes, the cross is a synecdoche (a part for the whole, right?) for the work of Christ.

You also cite verses attributing salvation to the "blood" of Christ, and Amen to that. But then you make another false distinction--"It is the blood, NOT the cross, of Christ that effects my redemption." Where did this "not" come from? Whence arises this false alternative? Why must one choose--blood VERSUS cross--as if these were in opposition to each other as competing means of salvation. This is simply not the way that the Biblical writers express themselves, nor does Christian devotion do this.

And what would we say to the person who, adopting your method, next insists that NOT the "blood" of Christ but instead the "life, death, and resurrection" of Christ redeems us? We would tell him to stop splitting hairs in such an un-Christian way. A few years ago there was a tempest in a teapot along just these lines when someone (was it John MacArthur?) tried to get logical--and got very eccentric and unhistorical--and said that the blood of Christ per se doesn't save us; rather, the "blood" is (he could have said) a synecdoche or metonymy for the death of Christ (or the work of Christ), which is what saves us, and not the blood.

This level of analysis (Jesus versus blood versus cross) is simply not where Christians live. Rather, we see all these things conjoined: "through HIM [Jesus] to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the BLOOD of His CROSS" (Col. 1:20). I have every confidence that, outside of this context, you'd easily speak and write this way.

I agree, however, that all of this is a digression, but it really branches off of an earlier digression that you made. Kamelda argued that you were exaggerating esthetics and falsely equating it with holiness. (Apologies to Kamelda if I distort her point.) To press her point, she said that the cross (which is certainly a proper focus of Christian attention) is unesthetic, but still worthy. You dispute her assertion about the cross being unesthetic, and thereby side-step her point for which that was only an example. So leave the digression aside and address the real point:

How you can virtually equate tackiness with apostasy (notwithstanding 1 Cor 1:26-31)? How you can deny your fraternity with Christians of whose music you disapprove ("not my people")? How you can not only hold them in disdain and contempt but also encourage others to do the same?

It's possible that, unbeknownst to me but known to you, John Eliot Gardiner is a sincere Christian believer whose performances of these great Christian works are genuine acts of worship in spirit and in truth--but this is a detail you've omitted. Is that because it's irrelevant to your point? Pehaps you hold him up as an exemplar NOT of Christian fidelity or worship, but simply of artistic seriousness and excellence. Fair enough.

But does it trouble you that your tendency is to trash undoubted Gospel-believing and -teaching Christians like Fanny Crosby or Ron Hamilton, because of their "low" culture, while giving unqualified praise to the people who make it onto Deutsche Grammophon? Who is more likely to be greater in the Kingdom of Heaven--Fanny Crosby or John Gardiner? It seems that in your kingdom, John Eliot Gardiner is greater.

"If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God love his brother also." 1 John 4:20-21.

DGus, do you know what a syllogism is?

This is your recurring method of deflecting problems and questions--using an arch question as if to say, "You're stupid and I can ignore you, but I want to try to amuse the others in the hope that they'll agree by default." I'm quite sure this works for the usual suspects, but there are at least a here who know evasion when they see it. In this case, by speaking of a syllogism, you imply a logical defect in what I wrote; but if you want to allege a logical defect, you should point it out.

And by the way, you are teaching bad manners to your myrmidons.

Is that a Yes or No?

You really are spoiling for a fight. Not getting the response that you want so you try to include more people in your lashing out. Myrmidons? If you are trying to appeal to others you might want to speak plainly instead of trying to sound edumacated. The suit doesn't fit you.

Sorry, I should have highlighted that my comment was directed to DGus.

Dear Dorian: "Spoiling for a fight"? and "trying to sound edumacated"? Hmmm.--

a. There are indeed many holes in my education. But I don't think I should apologize for knowing what myrmidons are or using the word. Fortunately, anyone whose vocabulary lacks that word so far can look it up and then know it. Ain't edumacation wonderful.

b. Dissidens began this thread by characterizing contrary arguments as being like those "heard on the playground" or "on Jerry Springer". Maybe you can show me the point in the conversation where you feel I disrupted the prevailing civility.

c. If the comment really did hurt your feelings, then of course I'm sorry for the hurt. But since I don't know you and didn't have you personally in mind in anything I said, I hope you aren't taking it too personally.

d. I do indeed feel strongly about the errors that I have addressed here. I don't apologize for that. I think they are serious.

e. Your comment employs another evasion used here, the one that avoids the subject by commenting on the commenter and his interior conditions--not the substance of his posts but supposed defects in the manner of his expression. As fascinated as I always am with the subject of me, and as almost irresistible as the subject is, I would still prefer that the substance be addressed instead.

DGus, why don't you answer the question and find out if it is an "arch question"?

Perhaps it is a legitimate question and if you'd answer it, the discussion could move on.

Do you know what a syllogism is?

OK, I'll bite. Yes, of course I do. Major premise, minor premise, conclusion. Dissidens is a man; all men are bipeds; Dissidens is a biped.

Swell!

Now you said:

But does it trouble you that your tendency is to trash undoubted Gospel-believing and -teaching Christians like Fanny Crosby or Ron Hamilton, because of their "low" culture, while giving unqualified praise to the people who make it onto Deutsche Grammophon? Who is more likely to be greater in the Kingdom of Heaven--Fanny Crosby or John Gardiner? It seems that in your kingdom, John Eliot Gardiner is greater.

Now I don’t believe I ever said a word about who was and who wasn’t going to Heaven, either or both Fanny and John Eliot. Nor do I recall saying anything about their relative standing if they both get there.

Please show where I said that, or, if you think I didn’t say it explicitly but that it logically follows from what I did say, then put those statements in the form of a syllogism.

Thanks.

Now it's my turn to urge you to read more carefully. I said nothing about your views of who will go heaven, and my comment presumes (because I hope) that both Crosby and Gardiner will be in heaven. I also said nothing about your views of which of them would be greater in the Kingdom of Heaven, although my comment question belies my own belief that Fanny Crosby will be greater in the Kingdom of Heaven than John Eliot Gardiner, and my assumption that most folks would agree--even you. What I did say about you is this: In your kingdom ("Remonstrans"), it's John Eliot Gardiner who is treated as greater--and that is what I observed, and that is what I criticize.

The true values of the Kingdom of Heaven are not valued in your kingdom. Your posts show respect for intelligent people, and mock and berate the unintelligent. Your posts hold up talented people for admiration, and heap scorn on the untalented. You break the bruised reed and snuff out the smoldering wick.

Just as I anticipated: no quotation and no syllogism. Still no argument. Just a slight refinement of your accusation. (And more assumptions.)

Ironic that you should do this when the point of this post was to illustrate poor quality of thought.

Let me try once more, when did I "berate the unintelligent"?

Quotation or syllogism.

Or both.

Dissidens: If you anticipated what I would say, then why (in #29) did you, despite that anticipation, completely wrongly characterize my comment?--the very one you quoted (but didn't understand? didn't read?). You protested, "I don’t believe I ever said a word about who was and who wasn’t going to Heaven". Good point. But my predictable response is: No one ever said you did. You "anticipated" I'd respond thus? Good prediction. Obvious, but correct. It hasn't advanced the discussion very much.

You complain about "more assumptions"--but my only assumption was that most folks here, including you, would expect Crosby to be greater in the Kingdom of Heaven. I made the assumption explicit precisely so that you could deny it if you wish, but you didn't. Well, go ahead; it's not too late. Deny, and tell us why instead you expect Gardiner to be greater (if you do). This would in fact help to justify your exaltation of him and your detraction of Fanny Crosby. Someone who happens to know that Gardiner is a devout and pious Christian believer (as opposed to being in the moribund mainstream of the Church of England) might for that reason think Gardiner destined for heavenly greatness--but I earlier opened the door for you to share that fact (if it's a fact), and you didn't. Instead, you leave us having to wonder whether it's possible he's even one of the NON-Christians with which the C of E is lousy. Or someone could think Gardiner is likely to be greater in the Kingdom of Heaven no matter his Christian or non-Christian profession, because God really puts a premium on "serious" musicians, whose vinyl fills His celestial closets.

Of course I don't for an instant really think that you would consciously substitute earthly esthetic values for authentic heavenly values. But my belief is that in the treatments and discussions of these issues in your posts, the heavenly values are forgotten (or temporarily set aside) and the esthetic values are exaggerated. There's no denying that John Eliot Gardner's artistic accomplishments vastly exceed Fanny Crosby's, just as in Jesus' day there was no denying that the rich man's offering was objectively and verifiably more valuable than the widow's two pitiful mites; but Jesus teaches us not to look at it that way.

Now you say, "Let me try once more, when did I 'berate the unintelligent'?" Try WHAT "once more"? This is your first request for instances in which you "berate the unintelligent". It's tedious but not at all difficult to come up with such instances, since insulting the intelligence of your opponents occurs often enough. Look no further than #21 and #27 above ("do you know what a syllogism is?"). You recently called Kamelda's argument "astoundingly simplistic" (after distorting it). Here are some other gems I came up with in the time available. The first set were all directed to the same individual--

"I think maybe you are very, very smart and are only acting like a dunce in order to amuse."
http://remonstrans.net/index.php/2005/08/25/somewhat_misunderstandable#c870
"Tell me something, cap. I'm just really curious: Do you ever aspire to be taken seriously?"
http://remonstrans.net/index.php/2005/08/25/somewhat_misunderstandable#c874
"I know you are just repeating words you’ve heard grown-ups use...."
http://remonstrans.net/index.php/2005/08/25/somewhat_misunderstandable#c884
"I hate to say it, but you have problems with more than prepositions."
http://remonstrans.net/index.php/2005/08/12/worship_is_never_accidental#c701
"I'll just go ahead and tear Romans 14 out of my Bible then, shall I, cap?"
http://remonstrans.net/index.php/2005/08/25/somewhat_misunderstandable#c865
"If you ever considered what it would be like to live your life on a think-before-you-speak principle, now would be an excellent time for you to give it a trial run."
http://remonstrans.net/index.php/2005/09/08/two_items_of_business#c985

--and the rest were of broader application:

"Perhaps you take too seriously the miseducated waifs and apologists of degeneracy we keep on Remonstrans for illustrative purposes."
http://remonstrans.net/index.php/2005/08/30/beauty_is_not_skin_deep#c936
"[T]hanks for putting it into such elegant expression, Rev. William Poole; something the kids can skip rope to."
http://remonstrans.net/index.php/2005/08/10/none_of_god_all_of_self#c650
"Wow, that's really sad."
http://remonstrans.net/index.php/2005/09/03/title_12#c945
"Then, after giving a slapdash collection of warnings that are not even directed at the same danger, he draws a conclusion! My sixth grade composition teacher, Mrs. Jeffries, would have had my hide stretched across the large bulletin board before lunchtime."
http://remonstrans.net/index.php/2005/08/25/somewhat_misunderstandable
"I would like to see Mr. Kappelman make two synapses, if they ever existed, converge to produce an idea we can follow."
http://remonstrans.net/index.php/2005/08/24/disappearing_convergences

By way of contrast, the ideal to which I would strive--and from which I admittedly stray on these pages--is found in James 3:13-18:

"Who is a wise man and endued with knowledge among you? let him shew out of a good conversation his works with meekness of wisdom. But if ye have bitter envying and strife in your hearts, glory not, and lie not against the truth. This wisdom descendeth not from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish. For where envying and strife is, there is confusion and every evil work.

"But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be intreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy. And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace."

DGus,

Is your list meant to highlight your objection to tone or substance?

Still no syllogism?

And no quotation proving your charge.

Well, at least you admit you make assumptions, you just excuse them.

Sad.

I know you disapprove of many things I’ve said. I don’t care what you approve of. What I want to know is, “Did I say what you accused me of saying?”

Quotation or syllogism.

Either or both.

Dear Remonres:

I think we have two subjects at hand--exaggerated esthetics (which is "substance") and a failure of fraternal charity in the argument. The latter can result in bad discourse, which would be "tone" (using your dichotomy), but also may belie a bad ecclesiology (these are "not my people"), which is "substance". Or that's how I see it.

Dear Dissidens:

To prove a FACT, one usually uses evidence, not syllogistic logic. Was the traffic light red or green when Joe's car entered the intersection? Practically speaking, no syllogism will give you this answer. In an odd circumstance you might already have other undisputed facts that you can put into your premises that will yield a logical conclusion (the traffic light is always red, green, or yellow; the light was neither green nor yellow when Joe's car entered the intersection; therefore the light was red when Joe's car entered the intersection), but all that is mooted when you have evidence--such as a video of the car entering the intersection when the light is red.

The question you posed was one of FACT: Is it true (as I said) that, in posts on this blog, Dissidens has berated the unintelligent? Boy, that's a toughie, but with intense research, I did find a few. Because I have evidence, I don't need a syllogism. You say the charge is not proved. (Can't help noticing you didn't undertake to demonstrate THAT with a syllogism. Or counter-evidence? Or even a one-sentence explanation.) Since you don't suggest that an impostor is posting as "Dissidens", I have to assume that either you simply refuse to read the collection of your uncharitable sentences, or that you maintain unspoken quibbles in your own mind about the meaning of "berate" or "unintelligent". Whatever. People will judge for themselves.

I still can't believe you really intend that, in your world, blind ladies of devout Christian faith who are famous for trusting Jesus and writing inferior little songs about Him are held up for scorn and derision, but worldly great artists are praised and held up for emulation without regard to their profession of faith.

No Christian could intend that.
Dissidens is a Christian.
Therefore Dissidens does not really intend that.

There! A syllogism!

DGus, you are a real hoot.

“…famous for trusting Jesus” is she? Wow; I guess if she’s famous for trusting Jesus I’ll have to rethink this whole notion of proper and acceptable worship. Is she famous for anything else we should know about before drawing any conclusions about our obligations to God? What about Bernard of Cluny? Was he famous enough for trusting Jesus that we might consider his contributions to worship? How shall we compare their celebrity when we go about selecting our liturgy? If we go with a simple headcount, wouldn’t that unfairly advantage Christians of early centuries?

You said, "But does it trouble you that your tendency is to trash undoubted Gospel-believing and -teaching Christians like Fanny Crosby or Ron Hamilton, because of their "low" culture, while giving unqualified praise to the people who make it onto Deutsche Grammophon? Who is more likely to be greater in the Kingdom of Heaven--Fanny Crosby or John Gardiner? It seems that in your kingdom, John Eliot Gardiner is greater."

I asked you several times for evidence of where, or how, I said this. You produced nothing, instead you denied that you compared Fanny and John Eliot in the Kingdom of Heaven (when we can all read what you wrote) and said you were talking about my kingdom of “Remonstrans”.

Well, anyone who as visited this “Kingdom of Remonstrans” knows that no one here has opined about the salvation of John Eliot or Fanny. No one other than you. Nor has anyone estimated their comparative greatness. (In fact, I would be interested to know who is more famous, Crosby or Gardiner? I wonder if SharperIron could do a survey.)

What I have said repeatedly—here in “the kingdom”—is that American Christianity has apostatized; it has disconnected itself from any real love of goodness, submission to truth or affection for beauty. Neither Fundamentalism nor Neo-evangelicalism retains any significant grasp of the transcendental nature of its faith. We observed that insofar as these transcendentals are valued, they are valued privately and are suspended when we go to religious services. We cited instance after instance: we listened to its radios stations, we heard their chapels (which they broadcast), we watch their worship (which they telecast), we read their books and tracts, we consider their “surveys”, we listen to their gospel troupes… We compare their beliefs with those of our predecessors. We observe, with men like Wells, that they have No Place for Truth. Of this you say little.

You obviously cannot deal with that, so your recourse has been to imagine things. And when you finally do produce a syllogism, it is a very, very sloppy one, and—get this—it pretends to say something about “intentions”. From day one you have imagined motives and judged intentions.

Amazing. What other person would make a syllogism judging all christians’ intentions in the major premise and assuming an individual’s membership in that class in the minor premise?

It boggles the mind in a most impressive way.

The astute reader will recall that we did not put John Eliot forward as an example of a redeemed man, we put him forward as an example of a serious man. We did this in the context of calls for seriousness, from all sorts of people like Kevin Bauder, Mark Bailey and Dan Rather.

We asked, and continue to ask, How can we know what serious means to you guys?

Maybe you could imagine something for us.

But I plead with you not to put it in the form of a syllogism.

Dear Dissidens:

I guess you count on people not really reading things and settling instead for your summaries; and maybe for the people you care about, your bluster carries the thing along. But your characterization in the previous comment of who said what, and then who asked whom to prove what, is simply wrong. Fortunately, that particular set of errors is not material to any point other than your own uncharitable treatment of others, as to which anyone reading this blog has ample material to make his own judgments, whether for you or against you. Go back and read your posts, if you can bear it, and see what you actually asked for. Now you seem to be asking for proof that you have really trashed Fanny Crosby and Ron Hamilton (or that you have praised John Eliot Gardiner?). Maybe a Google search could answer the question. I'm finished with intern research projects on what you said about what. How about you point to an instance in which you've said anything favorable or neutral about Fanny Crosby.

It's easier for you to deal with arguments if you can imagine that everyone who opposes you can be lumped into a pile of people who love mediocre music and art and and go to a hick church and like Willow Creek. It just isn't so. That's not me. And if we've ever sung a Fanny Crosby song in my church, I'm not aware of it. (Not that I'd complain if we did.) But you seem to be in a clautrophobic world in which there are two religious choices: (a) cornball Fundamentalism, and (b) undifferentiated Liberalism. You value art (but NOT theater) and doctrinal rigor, and find one or both of them lacking in every instance of Fundamentalism that you see, so you conclude that we're in the Great Apostasy that we have to just wait out under the juniper tree.

Yes we should pursue excellence. But we should do it without treating as "apostasy" the failings and foibles of the likes of Fanny Crosby.

Yah, Fanny Crosby.

That would be the one famous for trusting Jesus, would it?

http://www.cmalliance.org/devotions/tozer/tozer.jsp?id=1302

What did A.W. Tozer think of Fanny Crosby's songs? Anybody know?

"Tozer's sermons were never shallow," writes Snyder. "There was hard thinking behind them, and [he] forced his hearers to think with him. He had the ability to make his listeners face themselves in the light of what God was saying to them. The flippant did not like Tozer; the serious who wanted to know what God was saying to them loved him."
http://www.intouch.org/myintouch/mighty/portraits/aw_tozer_213610.html

For those that need to know more about Tozer:

Many of his books are online, here is one..
http://calvarychapel.com/library/Tozer-AW/PursuitOfGod/0.htm

Also, his sermons:
http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/mydownloads/viewcat.php?cid=6

DGus and Dissidens,

If I had the power, I'd spank you both and give each of you a timeout.

Were each of you debaters when you were in school? Are you lawyers? It seems like both of you are, to some extent or the other, more interested in trapping the other than in genuinely helping people like me who are sincerely interested in some of the topics that are discussed in this site.

Since you both are determined to have a debate, here's how I have to judge it. As the first speaker, Dissidens had the burden of proof and laid it out pretty succinctly. But then DGus raised a few questions, some of which, frankly, were to this observer legitimate and, if answerered, would have advanced this observer's understanding of some issues important to this observer. I may be one of the "unintelligent", but I don't think Dissidens has answered the questions with the way he has responded. I say "I don't think" because I really don't know - perhaps, Dissidens' cryptic responses answer the questions but if so I'm too dense to see it.

So, DGus has probably technically won the debate (if I were the judge) - as a judge, I assume "unanswered" arguments cannot be answered.

Which is sad, because all of us readers are the real losers. I think we would all benefit from a rational discussion of issues. The verbal sparring is of limited (very limited) benefit. Occasionally, we'll glean a small point here or there, but the going's tough and the picking's slim.

Here's my earnest and sincere request: kiss and make up.

DGus, keep asking questions, maybe Dissidens will forgive you for whatever you did to get on his bad side and eventually remember that many of us come here not looking for a fight but for help - and will choose to honor you with a meaningful reply that all of us can understand.

Dissidens, can you at least consider that there apparently don't seem to be many other than DGus who can, or are willing to, take you on? You act as if his questioning or disagreeing with you is a bad thing; it's not. It sharpens the issues and aids understanding. If his arguments are specious; explain to us, less crytically than you have so far, why. Try to dialogue with DGus instead of this constant (mostly) meaningless debating. I am sincere when I state that I think your readers will appreciate it and benefit from it. At least I will.

I plead guilty to being a lawyer (a bad one), and to being unduly susceptible getting more caught up in trying to score points (or defending my shabby little honor) than in edifying others or advancing the truth. I decline to take the spanking, but I'll accept the time out. Fair enough. Suggest how long.

Anon:

Thanks for your comments. For you and for similarly irritated visitors, please read the explanation above in the form of a new post: Once Again.

And may I suggest that in the future, if you feel the need to spank someone, make a baby.