How Myths are Made
Wow. A six-week hiatus, and I still don’t feel rested. Plus, I’m now behind six weeks. Where to begin?
You would never know by Jonathan Prejean’s version of events (see here as well) that the real reason he quickly retreated from his recent dialogue over the Grammatico-Historical Method, pulled the link to NTRMin he had on his blog, and decided quietly to pursue his strange love affair with an obscure Spanish philosopher as the sine qua non and measure of all Christian truth (funny, I thought that was the pope’s job), while maintaining his ridiculous argument against the grammatico-historical method based on the equally ridiculous notion that no one can really understand anything apart from "shared premises" (why then is he trying to convince us of that?), is because he had his teeth handed to him by Jason Engwer and Steve Hays. I will be addressing his idiotic, triumphalistic ramblings found on the “God Talk” forum (is that really what it is?) very soon. How anyone with a modicum of shame can be so bombastic so soon after so clearly being KO’d in a recent debate, and proving that defeat by running away with his tail tucked firmly between his legs, is beyond me. Overcompensation, I suppose. In the meantime, if anyone missed it, here are the links that made Prejean turn tail and run:
Prejean Refuted 1; Prejean Refuted 2; Prejean Refuted 3; Prejean Refuted 4; Prejean Refuted 5; Prejean Refuted 6; Prejean Refuted 7; Prejean Refuted 8; Prejean Refuted 9; Prejean Refuted 10; Prejean Refuted 11; Prejean Refuted 12; Prejean Refuted 13; Prejean Refuted 14; Prejean Refuted 15; Prejean Refuted 16; Prejean Refuted 17; Prejean Refuted 18; Prejean Refuted 19; Prejean Refuted 20; Prejean Refuted 21; Prejean Refuted 22.
Oh yeah; and Prejean has suddenly developed a warm regard for the postmoderns at Confusio Sanctorum, a site which he happily endorses on his blog. Coincidence? All of these facts demonstrate something I’ve tacitly demonstrated about Prejean in the past; namely, he is nothing more than a hack and a fraud. Yes, I know; this is the charge that he made against me, and then retracted. Since we are now in agreement that I am not a hack and a fraud, all that remains is to get him to concede that he is. Then we’ll be in complete agreement.
Speaking of the postmoderns at Confusio Sanctorum, one of them—the one with the chronic case of bacheloritis, the loudest mouth, and the biggest chip on his shoulder (need I say more?)—has once again called attention to himself and to the great injustice he has suffered at the hands of his enemy. Armed with his unfinished undergraduate degree from an obscure and isolated, marginally-Presbyterian school located somewhere amid the tumbleweeds of Idaho, his freshly imparted knowledge gleaned from the most recent philosophy book he happens to have read at any given moment, and his trusty friend the CAP-LOCK key, he is always a stalwart barometer of truth. With these three impenetrable weapons at his side, he has decided once again that he must slay his dread nemesis; apparently, some “White King” who goes by the name “Svendsen.” As legend and lore has it, this “White King” is anything but, as he roams the Interverse devouring whom he will. Preying upon feeble minds, he takes them captive, rips them away from the Kingdom of catholicity, and forces them to do his bidding. And so our young hero has made it his life’s mission to do all he can—all that is possible—to rid the Interverse of this dark lord once and for all. Sometimes that involves reminding those twice his age, twice his life-experience, thrice his educational experience, and ten times his social and cultural awareness that he somehow possesses more wisdom, more insight, better communication abilities, and superior critical-thinking skills than they.
Remember, a huge part of this person’s “bacheloritis” is bound up in his naïve belief that he—and by extension, we—must uncritically treat every new and trendy philosophy book he happens upon (many of which were in vogue twenty years ago but are no longer) as though it were sacred writ, leading to his bandying about the Internet beating everyone else over the head with his newly acquired gnosis that somehow imparts to him a superior understanding of how the world works. Can you say Don Quixote?
One of our own NTRMin forum members got a taste of this recently when she dared to ask this person how it’s possible for him to see the Great White King no matter he looks, as though this beast were omnipresent. I winced when I saw her simple question met with what can only be described as blustering, seething rage—not only toward that Great White-King-Svendsen beast, but also toward her and toward the entire kingdom of hapless minions the beast bewitched into following him! If someone can return volley to her innocent question with such blustering vitriol, it amply demonstrates where the “heart” of the problem lies.
Moreover, the continual screed of this person and his “Reformed Catholics”—namely, that their idiosynscratic view of Calvin and Luther is some kind of litmus test for Reformdoxy—is really nothing more than a historical novum. Look it up. How many Reformed writers in the ensuing centuries after the Reformation viewed Luther and Calvin the way TGE and his cohorts view them? Not one of the Reformed has ever taught that we ought to view Luther and Calvin as the beginning and end of the Reformation. Not one of them appeals to the beliefs of “Venerable Calvin” or “Venerable Luther” as the standard for Reformed orthodoxy. Not one. They instead constantly point us to Scripture as that standard.
Hence, for all the bluster we hear about how “radical” we are, and how “sectarian” we are, and how far away from the Reformers we are, in reality these men could not be further away from the mindset and operating principle of the Reformers of any century. They cling to Luther and Calvin as some sort of household gods who will save them from the “radical sectarianism” of Evangelicalism. But not one of their predecessors took that approach. The Reformers—sixteenth-, seventeenth, or eighteenth-century, it matters not—relied on Scripture, not Calvin and Luther. The Westminster Divines, for instance, cite Scripture extensively for justification of their belief; but you will not find them appealing to the beliefs of Calvin or Luther as their standard. Hence, in an ironic twist, the “radical sectarianism” the “Reformed Catholics” feared so much, and from which they pinned their hopes on Calvin and Luther to rescue them, has fallen upon them like a brick wall. They are cluelessly disconnected from what it means to be “Reformed.” It is they who are the radical sectarians in all this; not the rest of us.
By the way, Steve Hays has another great response to more of Enloe’s tiresome ramblings at http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2005/09/little-lord-fauntleroy.html. In this blog entry, Hays refers to Enloe as “poor little Enloe”—an entirely appropriate nomenclature. Not for his physical stature, mind you (for all I know he is eight feet tall); but for his spiritual stature. He is a pitiable man; miserable, always grumbling and complaining about his perceived lot in life; full of hatred and bitterness; characterized by enraged outbursts of anger; taken captive by vain philosophies; preferring the traditions of men over the word of God; always learning but never coming to a knowledge of the truth; pitiable indeed; “little” indeed.
Especially regarding his dealings with Evangelicals at larger, we do well to bear in mind the words of the Apostle John concerning one who is so taken by hatred and anger: “Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.” Yes, I know it’s not fashionable or politically correct. And I know that all the horror-stricken postmoderms will flail at me with their atrophied arms about how we’re not supposed to judge anyone. Poppycock. I prefer to listen to the word of God which tells me I must make these kinds of judgments so that the rest of the church is not deceived by these people. We do well to evaluate these situations in the light of the word of God, and to discern based on that word what "poor little Enloe" really is—or rather, what he really is not.
You would never know by Jonathan Prejean’s version of events (see here as well) that the real reason he quickly retreated from his recent dialogue over the Grammatico-Historical Method, pulled the link to NTRMin he had on his blog, and decided quietly to pursue his strange love affair with an obscure Spanish philosopher as the sine qua non and measure of all Christian truth (funny, I thought that was the pope’s job), while maintaining his ridiculous argument against the grammatico-historical method based on the equally ridiculous notion that no one can really understand anything apart from "shared premises" (why then is he trying to convince us of that?), is because he had his teeth handed to him by Jason Engwer and Steve Hays. I will be addressing his idiotic, triumphalistic ramblings found on the “God Talk” forum (is that really what it is?) very soon. How anyone with a modicum of shame can be so bombastic so soon after so clearly being KO’d in a recent debate, and proving that defeat by running away with his tail tucked firmly between his legs, is beyond me. Overcompensation, I suppose. In the meantime, if anyone missed it, here are the links that made Prejean turn tail and run:
Prejean Refuted 1; Prejean Refuted 2; Prejean Refuted 3; Prejean Refuted 4; Prejean Refuted 5; Prejean Refuted 6; Prejean Refuted 7; Prejean Refuted 8; Prejean Refuted 9; Prejean Refuted 10; Prejean Refuted 11; Prejean Refuted 12; Prejean Refuted 13; Prejean Refuted 14; Prejean Refuted 15; Prejean Refuted 16; Prejean Refuted 17; Prejean Refuted 18; Prejean Refuted 19; Prejean Refuted 20; Prejean Refuted 21; Prejean Refuted 22.
Oh yeah; and Prejean has suddenly developed a warm regard for the postmoderns at Confusio Sanctorum, a site which he happily endorses on his blog. Coincidence? All of these facts demonstrate something I’ve tacitly demonstrated about Prejean in the past; namely, he is nothing more than a hack and a fraud. Yes, I know; this is the charge that he made against me, and then retracted. Since we are now in agreement that I am not a hack and a fraud, all that remains is to get him to concede that he is. Then we’ll be in complete agreement.
Speaking of the postmoderns at Confusio Sanctorum, one of them—the one with the chronic case of bacheloritis, the loudest mouth, and the biggest chip on his shoulder (need I say more?)—has once again called attention to himself and to the great injustice he has suffered at the hands of his enemy. Armed with his unfinished undergraduate degree from an obscure and isolated, marginally-Presbyterian school located somewhere amid the tumbleweeds of Idaho, his freshly imparted knowledge gleaned from the most recent philosophy book he happens to have read at any given moment, and his trusty friend the CAP-LOCK key, he is always a stalwart barometer of truth. With these three impenetrable weapons at his side, he has decided once again that he must slay his dread nemesis; apparently, some “White King” who goes by the name “Svendsen.” As legend and lore has it, this “White King” is anything but, as he roams the Interverse devouring whom he will. Preying upon feeble minds, he takes them captive, rips them away from the Kingdom of catholicity, and forces them to do his bidding. And so our young hero has made it his life’s mission to do all he can—all that is possible—to rid the Interverse of this dark lord once and for all. Sometimes that involves reminding those twice his age, twice his life-experience, thrice his educational experience, and ten times his social and cultural awareness that he somehow possesses more wisdom, more insight, better communication abilities, and superior critical-thinking skills than they.
Remember, a huge part of this person’s “bacheloritis” is bound up in his naïve belief that he—and by extension, we—must uncritically treat every new and trendy philosophy book he happens upon (many of which were in vogue twenty years ago but are no longer) as though it were sacred writ, leading to his bandying about the Internet beating everyone else over the head with his newly acquired gnosis that somehow imparts to him a superior understanding of how the world works. Can you say Don Quixote?
One of our own NTRMin forum members got a taste of this recently when she dared to ask this person how it’s possible for him to see the Great White King no matter he looks, as though this beast were omnipresent. I winced when I saw her simple question met with what can only be described as blustering, seething rage—not only toward that Great White-King-Svendsen beast, but also toward her and toward the entire kingdom of hapless minions the beast bewitched into following him! If someone can return volley to her innocent question with such blustering vitriol, it amply demonstrates where the “heart” of the problem lies.
Moreover, the continual screed of this person and his “Reformed Catholics”—namely, that their idiosynscratic view of Calvin and Luther is some kind of litmus test for Reformdoxy—is really nothing more than a historical novum. Look it up. How many Reformed writers in the ensuing centuries after the Reformation viewed Luther and Calvin the way TGE and his cohorts view them? Not one of the Reformed has ever taught that we ought to view Luther and Calvin as the beginning and end of the Reformation. Not one of them appeals to the beliefs of “Venerable Calvin” or “Venerable Luther” as the standard for Reformed orthodoxy. Not one. They instead constantly point us to Scripture as that standard.
Hence, for all the bluster we hear about how “radical” we are, and how “sectarian” we are, and how far away from the Reformers we are, in reality these men could not be further away from the mindset and operating principle of the Reformers of any century. They cling to Luther and Calvin as some sort of household gods who will save them from the “radical sectarianism” of Evangelicalism. But not one of their predecessors took that approach. The Reformers—sixteenth-, seventeenth, or eighteenth-century, it matters not—relied on Scripture, not Calvin and Luther. The Westminster Divines, for instance, cite Scripture extensively for justification of their belief; but you will not find them appealing to the beliefs of Calvin or Luther as their standard. Hence, in an ironic twist, the “radical sectarianism” the “Reformed Catholics” feared so much, and from which they pinned their hopes on Calvin and Luther to rescue them, has fallen upon them like a brick wall. They are cluelessly disconnected from what it means to be “Reformed.” It is they who are the radical sectarians in all this; not the rest of us.
By the way, Steve Hays has another great response to more of Enloe’s tiresome ramblings at http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2005/09/little-lord-fauntleroy.html. In this blog entry, Hays refers to Enloe as “poor little Enloe”—an entirely appropriate nomenclature. Not for his physical stature, mind you (for all I know he is eight feet tall); but for his spiritual stature. He is a pitiable man; miserable, always grumbling and complaining about his perceived lot in life; full of hatred and bitterness; characterized by enraged outbursts of anger; taken captive by vain philosophies; preferring the traditions of men over the word of God; always learning but never coming to a knowledge of the truth; pitiable indeed; “little” indeed.
Especially regarding his dealings with Evangelicals at larger, we do well to bear in mind the words of the Apostle John concerning one who is so taken by hatred and anger: “Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.” Yes, I know it’s not fashionable or politically correct. And I know that all the horror-stricken postmoderms will flail at me with their atrophied arms about how we’re not supposed to judge anyone. Poppycock. I prefer to listen to the word of God which tells me I must make these kinds of judgments so that the rest of the church is not deceived by these people. We do well to evaluate these situations in the light of the word of God, and to discern based on that word what "poor little Enloe" really is—or rather, what he really is not.
posted by NA at 10:08 AM
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