Never Again?

Just the other day AKMA was lamenting about his perceived lack of impact in the theological guild.  There are some good encouragements and some very astute observations in the comments from that post that I strongly recommend you read.  That post and those comments, in concert with conversations in the TA room here at Mac and some other stuff that's going on around the College, have gotten me thinking about the nature of the biblical and theological guild these days.

There was a time, especially in the late 19th and early to mid 20th centuries when the work of a single scholar could bust the whole enterprise open.  Gunkel, Bultmann, even Childs who's work is often dismissed...all of these people and more blew the doors off of the scholarly community.  I wonder if that's even possible anymore.

One of the things that is constantly on the mind of a PhD student is how to make that friggin dissertation work.  Every institution that I know of has listed as an explicit requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy that the disseration "make an original contribution to the field of X."  Of course there's a part of me that agrees that this is absolutely necessary.  How can you be an expert without demonstrating that you can push the discussion forward?  Another part of me is forced to admit that "pushing the discussion forward" means an entirely different thing now than it has before.  There was a time when a single scholar could actually "push the discussion forward."  Now all one of us can hope to do is to nudge the monolith half a milimeter one way or the other.

Take the work of Cristo Van der Merwe.  Chances are even some biblical scholars out there don't really know his name.  The fact is, however, that Van der Merwe, in his relentless attempts to engage OT/HB research with the latest in modern linguistics, has made serious contributions to our understanding of Hebrew.  In my opinion his Biblical Hebrew Reference Grammar should be the standard text in the field.  But it ain't.  It ain't, and there are two reasons for that.  In the first place there is the "old school" that needs to defend the validity and importance of its work, and so upstarts need to be put in their place.  In the second place there's me, the (hopefully) up-and-coming scholar who's job it is to show why my work is better than the last guy's.  And so what should be a sea-change, is instead just one more stiff breeze.

I don't know if there's anything to be done about all of this.  I don't even know if anything should be done about all of this.  Even as I'm writing this I feel ambiguous, conscious of the fact that even nudging the conversation is a pretty incredible accomplishment.  Having said that there is a part of me that is also working to redifine success in the field of academic biblical studies.  We need to move success beyond publishing contracts and good reviews, beyond the glory of 5,000 super-specialized uber-nerds relishing our work, and toward the grace of 30 undergrads who are shocked and challenged by the biblical texts, or the honour of bringing our humble contribution to the community of faith in worship services and bible studies.  This isn't just about academics either.  As a whole our culture has so badly mis-difined success.

Is it true that the academic landscape will never again be redrawn by a single hand?  Yes, it probably is.  But who says that's a bad thing?

What Words Do...

I've been thinking a lot about language and linguistics lately.  It's possible that this is a by-product of the fact that I'm taking a rather challenging course in advanced grammar and linguistics.  Just a guess, it's hard to say why I think what I think.  In any case, one of the most interesting and engaging concepts that I've come across lately is related to the question of what language is for.  There's a linguist out there, a guy named Halliday (I quoted him about a zillion years ago in my last post), who suggests that language has a whole bunch of different functions.  That is to say, language does a lot of things.  Most of these things (I won't bother listing them all, it's kind of complicated) eventually clump together as we grow older.  Eventually the most important clump, or meta-function, is the informational function.  Language for adults is mostly about communicating information, about telling something to somebody that he/she doesn't know (or that we think he/she doesn't know, whatever).

Here's the thing, though.  For kids this is one of the least important functions that language performs.  I'm not sure exactly when this happens, I haven't read all of the relavant research, but early on in life when we are learning language we don't really think about language as a tool to give others new information.  If you have little kids who have only recently learned to talk watch them and see if this seems right or not.  It works with my son.  If he sees a picture of a cow he says "Cow!"  I'm pretty sure he's not telling me it's a cow.  He knows I know that.  What he's telling me is that he likes cows.  He's using language to communicate not information, but emotion.  He's engaging with me relationally.

This is, I think, why we have so much difficulty with poetry.  We are so fixated on what the poem means that we completely miss what it is that poems are for.  Poetry is trying to do something other than give information, it is trying to create an emotional encounter.

Let me put it another way.  If I come home and my wife looks at me angrily and says "You're late," she is not using the informational meta-function of language.  She is not trying to inform me of the fact that I am late.  If I assume that her words are being used to communicate information the evening is likely going to go badly for me.

Your words do a lot of things, and though communicating information is an important one of those things, it isn't the only one.  As an excercise today, try being more conscious of the relational aspect of your language and the language of those around you.  Be attentive to what your words do and not just to what they mean.  It is, at the very least, a fun experiment.

Surprised by the Successes...

Michael Halliday, the renowned linguist, once wrote: "[Rather] than being surprised at the failures [of language], given the complexity of modern cultures, it seems to me we should be surprised at the successes." - Language, context, and text, pg. 9.

We so often become upset, even angry, that we are misunderstood.  The fact is, it takes only a very little time studying the theoretical structure of language before one starts to realize that it is a miracle of the most profound order that anybody understands anything said by anybody else at all.  Human language is a cultural sign-system of such monumental complexity that studying linguistics (that is, studying the nature of language) is one of the more difficult philosophical and socio-scientific tasks out there.  But for all of that, the fact remains that language works in the world every second of every day.  You are using language right now, in order to read this post.  Though you, whoever you are, are nowhere near me right now, you understand me.  Even the errors of grammar that are likely present in this post matter very little.  Your mind is simply too fluent, to magnificent, to be stopped by what should, by all accounts, be an all but impossible task.

So perhaps we should be slower to anger when we are misunderstood.  Perhaps we should be more joyful when we feel that another person has grasped what it was that we meant.  Let us not be surprised by our communicative failures, but let us be surprised, and delighted, by our successes.

Ridonculous...

I'm writing today and tomorrow, and that title is simply the only way to describe my current outline. Before I write a paper I always create an extensive outline to make sure that I stay on track (I have a tendency to rabbit-trail [mostly a by-product of my love for parenthetical remarks {which is probably due to my constant need to over-qualify every statement that I make (which is, I'm sure, evidence of some kind of deep-seeded psychosis or neurosis)}]). Today's outline is officially totally and completely out of hand. It is currently 3,949 words long. The paper is supposed to be 5,000 words long. Did I mention that the outline isn't done yet? It's hardly 2/3 done in fact. Ya, this is gonna end well.

Update: How's this for perverse? As I mentioned in the comments yesterday, my final outline was around 6,800 words. The final paper? 7,173 including bibliography, so really more like, 6,500 words. Ya, that's right, the outline was longer than the paper. Well, kind of. As always you can game stats almost interminably. When you add the footnotes to the word count of the final paper it's actually 9,600 words or so. Ya, I've got 3,000 words in the footnotes, got a problem with that? Also, I just want to reiterate that I love Endnotes. Without Endnotes I would have been up until 1:30am writing my bibliography, instead of just 12:30am. I can't believe that nobody ever told me about Endnotes, or anything like it for that matter, until last year. Typing out footnotes and bibliographies is for suckers!

Indeed.

Indeed.

Miami's Worst Cop...

I can't stand CSI: Miami.  The reason is pretty simple; Horatio Cane is an ass.  I'm sorry to put is so bluntly, particularly if you're fan,but there it is.  It's hard to know if Cane's many irritating idiosyncrasies are the product of David Caruso's influence, or the influence of the writers and directors of the show.  It's probably a combination of the two (though the rumours of Caruso's troubles on NYPD Blue may be some indication).  Caine's bizarre manerisms and idiotic dialogue are enough reason to dislike him as a character, but that's not why I call him the worst cop in Miami.

I've never seen a single episode of CSI: Miami where Caine does not at least draw his weapon, and he fires it almost as often.  CSI: Miami is currently running its 7th season.  As of January 19/09 they will have produced 155 episodes.  If we figure Caine's weapon-drawing ratio at once every second show (a wildly conservative estimate), then he has drawn his sidearm at least 72 times in 7 years.  That's more than 10 times per year.  I'll be even more conservative with my estimate of the number of times that Caine has discharged his firearm.  Let's say he shoots at someone only once every four episodes.  That means that he has, in seven years, fired his sidearm roughly 38 times.  Though he does not always hit what he shoots at, I'm sure that he has shot at least one person per season (again, a wildly conservative estimate).  So let's summarize our estimates of the good detective's stats.  In seven years Caine has drawn his sidearm 72 times, discharged it 38 times, and killed or injured more than 7 people.

I personally know three police officers.  To the best of my knowledge between the three of them, only one (a now-retired city cop) fired his sidearm in the line of duty, and that only one time in his entire
career.  Granted none of them worked in Miami-Dade county, which does have a reputation for crime, but I still think the comparison is meaningful.

If Caine were a real cop can you even imagine the number of times that he would have been investigated by IA?  Is there any chance at he would still be a lieutenant?  Is there any chance he would still have a job at all?

The point that I'm trying to make here is that good cops don't pull their guns every second day.  Good cops don't fire their weapons in the line of duty on a regular basis.  Good cops don't shoot lots and lots
of people.  In fact, good cops seem to do the opposite of those things.  Someone might object that Caine is just a television character and that I'm taking him too seriously.  He may be fictional, but the
place he holds in American life is as an icon of justice and that troubles me.  It tells me that justice in the minds of many Americans can be achieved through rampant violence.  That strikes me as a very bad thing.  It reminds me of an episode of the West Wing where Toby is arguing with somebody about gun control and he asks the rhetorical question "What?  Are Americans just more homicidal by nature?"

If Horatio Caine is an American hero, then Toby's question is worth exploring.

4712...

Just a quick plug: the first post of the new year is up on Four, Seven and Twelvefold.  For those of you who don't know, 4712 is a collaborative blog exploring conversations about evangelicalism and Christianity in the 21st century.  If you haven't been, check it out and feel free to jump in to the conversation.

Hooray for Empty Rooms...

I love weekends at the beginning of the semester.  Nothing is due tomorrow so there are no undergrads using up all of the plug-ins in the library.  Including me and the staff it looks like there are about 12 people at the Mills library today.  Hooray for empty rooms filled with books.

Locating Inspiration...

Where does divine inspiration lie in relation to the biblical text?  Was the author inspired tying it to authorial intent?  Are the words inspired tying it to the text?  Is the interpreter inspired tying it to reading strategy?  More importantly, how does the idea of inspiration and the location of inspiration relate to hermeneutics?  Do questions of inspirational location even matter if the hermeneutical considerations overshadow the problem?  For instance, if inspiration is tied to authorial intent but authorial intent is hermeneutically impossible to recover apart from the text itself, is it at all meaningful to call the individual authors inspired?  Or, if the text is inspired but texts are only interpreted (and perhaps even constructed) by readers, then is it at all meaningful to call the text inspired?  Or, if the reader is inspired then how does that inspiration proceed and of what purpose is the text at all?

These are the questions that are currently consuming my days as I attempt to write a paper about the relationship between biblical scholarship and Christian Theology.

At It Again...

The Christmas break is over and as of last Monday I'm officially back to school for semester #2.  So far it's been less overwhelming which is not surprising but still nice.  Though I enjoyed my classes last semester (particularly my OT in the NT class) this semester is much more exciting.  I'm taking Advanced Semitic Grammar and Linguistics, and Biblical Theology.  Biblical Theology in particular is a passion of mine, and linguistics is a discipline I've brushed up against a couple of times in the past and found very helpful (especially with some hermeneutical problems).

I also feel like I have a better handle on how to make this doctoral thing doable.  My research has gotten much more efficient and my focus much sharper, both of which are essential.  Hopefully that translates into better writing and less stress.  I'm not super hopeful about the second bit, but oh well.

The other thing I've noticed is how happy I am to be back at it.  I was totally exhausted by November last semester that the last few weeks were just a blur, like that final dash at the end of a long run.  But after a nice long break I was getting a little bored and stir crazy and it's nice to be working again.  After you train yourself for months and months to work all the time it becomes difficult to do anything else.  That's something to watch for I guess.

The Joy of Cooking...

As some of you know my main hobby is cooking. I spend an awful lot of time cooking, creating recipes, watching cooking shows, reading cooking books, etc. I got some money for Christmas this year from my parents and my Gram J, and I used it to buy two more lovely knives, thus (basically) completing my collection. I bought a Wusthof-Trident paring knife, and a Kasumi titanium 13mm chef's knife (which is really more of a utility knife). Here they are on the left. I got them both for a wicked awesome price at the Boxing Day sale at The Casual Gourmet here in Hamilton.

Yes, the Kasumi (the bottom knife) really is titanium...well, kind of. The knife is actually a Molybdenum-Vanadium alloy (a super hard steel) with a titanium coating. That's why it's black. They say the titanium creates a non-reactive coating on the blade so there's no flavour transfer from the steel to the food. I've heard this argument before with regard to ceramic knives, and it still sounds like utter bunk to me, but the titanium does seem to provide an excellent strength to weight ratio for the knife. In any case, it's absurdly light. A little bit too light honestly. I do like the knife, and it's vastly superior to the crappy old utility knife I've been using up until now, but my Global Chef's Knife and Santoku Knife are in no danger of being replaced. My other criticism is that the angle of attack on the handle is a little bit too steep. It feels like I'm putting my energy in the wrong place when I cut. That might be my imagination or it might just be a comfort issue. Overall I'd only give the knife a B rating.

Though it was the Kasumi that I was excited about, the Wusthof turned out the be the real treat. I went to the store with the intention of buying a MAC paring knife, but nothing in stock really turned my crank plus I've heard some mediocre things about MACs of late. Then the manager showed me the Wusthof Culinar series knife. She's not planning to stock that line anymore so the display models were 50% off, which seemed like just he right price to me, plus the all-steel look blends nicely with my Globals, so I went for it. I'm not generally a fan of German knives. I hate my Henckels knives, especially my five-star paring knife. It doesn't sharpen very well and can't keep an edge at all. It was also rather pricey which only adds to my deep bitterness. I've also tried some Wusthofs before and never been overly impressed. With all of this I wasn't expecting a lot from the paring knife, but it is awesome! Wonderfully sharp, lovely balance and hand feel, cuts like a dream...the perfect knife so far. The only test now is the durability of the edge, but it will take quite a while to finish that test (I hope). Without accounting for durability I'm happy to give this one an A+, though that will drop down to a B if the edge won't hold.

On the subject of cooking, Jin had an idea that I like. She suggested some kind of recipe exchange with my friends, so I thought I'd start on the blog. I've got quite a few recipes that I'm happy with at this point, many of which are my own, and I thought it would be nice to share the wealth. I'd also love to see your recipes, be they your originals or riffs on someone else's work. Here's a start from me.

BBQ Tangerine-Marinated Chicken:

1 medium roasting Chicken
1 small onion
3 cloves garlic
2 tangerines (may substitute orange or any kind)
1/4 cup good olive oil
1/4 cup good honey
2 Tbsp molasses
1 Tbsp dijon mustard
bunch of fresh thyme
BBQ sauce for basting

Remove the breast and back-bones of the chicken so that you have two equal halves (alternatively have your butcher do this). Clean and dry the bird. Season all sides liberally with salt and pepper. In a bowl combine the zest and juice from the tangerines (strain out any pulp or seeds) and oil with the honey, molasses, and mustard. Quantities of honey and molasses are approximate, use enough to balance the acidity of the juice. Roughly chop the onion and smash the garlic and place in a large ziploc bag along with several sprigs of thyme. Place chicken in bag, pour marinade over chicken. Remove any excess air from the bag and ensure that all of the surfaces of the chicken are in contact with the marinade. Leave the marinating chicken in the fridge for at least 2-3 hours, and preferably overnight.

When you're ready to cook, preheat the outside burners of your BBQ (if you only have 2, preheat one side). Place chicken skin-side down over the hot flame until it's achieved a nice golden colour (be very careful not to burn, there's a lot of sugar in the marinade), then transfer to a spot off of direct heat and close the lid. Baste the chicken several times throughout the process with BBQ sauce (I use homemade, but a good store bought variety will do). It's difficult to suggest a precise cooking time as BBQs can vary dramatically in temperature. Instead use a meat thermometer and cook until the temp is about 170-175f (the recommended temp for chicken is 180, but the meat will continue to cook a little bit while it rests). Remove to a plate and tent with foil, let rest approx 10-15 mins.

You can carve the chicken into four pieces if you like, or if you have a couple of people with hearty appetites, go ahead a serve the halves as they are. I like to serve this with homemade fries and either a salad or a nice veg.

Words of (Sci-fi) Wisdom...

I've been watching a lot of sci-fi lately, and even reading some.  All of this science-fiction exposure has led to some words of wisdom that I think would apply if you were ever to find yourself caught in a science-fiction story.  It is important to note that these bits of advice don't apply to the real world, but only to the science-fiction world, and should only be used in that particular reality.

1.  If you see a door open, or open a door yourself, and it makes an ominous noise, beware.  The door may or may not be dangerous.  The best way of knowing if it's immediately dangerous is the tone of the noise.  Minor key noises, bad; major key noises...well not good, there are no door-opening-noises that are good exactly, but if the noise is in a major key it's unlikely that a guy with a laser is about to charge through the door.
2.  All super-powerful artifacts are intrinsically dangerous.  In fact, the danger of the artifact is related directly to its power.  That is to say, the more powerful the artifact, the more dangerous it is to the user.
3.  If there is a place in the universe that you don't want to be, that's where you will find the person/object/information that you need most.
4.  If there is a wise and comforting mentor in your life, she/he will be dead as a door-nail by the third act.  Sorry, there's nothing to be done about it.
5.  If someone approaches you holding a harmless looking object in a threatening or ominous way, it very well may be an artifact of immense power (cf. item #2) and you should treat it accordingly.
6.  Grunge metal music in the background is a bad thing, especially if it's in a minor key and especially if there is somebody nearby welding something.
7.  Be very careful who you trust, you never know if it might be a killer robot.
8.  That woman/man you can't stand and constantly exchange sarcastic banter with?  That's your soul-mate, may as well just get it over with and make out with her/him already.
9.  Footsoldiers, peons, and "average" badguys of every description are the worst shots in the universe.  If one of them has you in his sights I wouldn't worry too much.
10.  Finally, the mystical power or energy that you think is bunk?  It's actually the most powerful tool available to you and you may as well just get on board with it.

Again, these pieces of wisdom are offered as a public service to all those of you who might, at some time or another, find yourselves in a science-fiction story.  I do hope that you find them helpful.

The Finish Line...

I'm writing again today.  As with the last time I posted on a writing day it's a paper for The Old Testament in the New Testament.  This time my outline was in the neighborhood of 2,800 words for a 5,000 word paper.  I'm about half done and sitting in the 2,000 word realm, so that's more or less right (the back end of papers are always longer, that's where the meat is).  The only problem is that this time I'm much, much more tired than the first time.  I've loved my first semester of PhD studies, but I can't pretend I'm not ready for a break.  Eventually mental attrition becomes a serious factor and I'm all the way there right now.  But I can see the finish line now.  My last assignment is due at 3:30pm tomorrow afternoon.  I'll give a 5 minute presentation, then I'll fall asleep until Thursday.  Seriously, it might actually happen in the classroom while the other students are presenting.  Don't anyone take it personally.  If you're in the class with me you feel free to fall asleep while I'm presenting, I won't mind at all.  Okay, I'm going to take a 30 minute break and then it's back at it until I can't make my fingers type anymore.  If things go well (which they generally don't) I'll be done before midnight tonight.  Wow that would be nice.

God on Trial...

Before going to bed last night I was channel surfing for a few minutes and ran across the tail end of a film.  It was clearly a holocaust film, set in one of the infamous barrack houses of an internment camp.  I watched for maybe 30 minutes, and for that entire time the action unfolded only in that little room filled with shaven-headed Jewish men in filthy prison garb.  It slowly dawned on me that I was watching a trial, and that the defendant was God himself.  The two dozen or so men had accused God of breaching his covenant with the Jewish people.  Men from around the room spoke, arguing their side of the case.  Some defended God, calling Auschwitz a test.  Others contended that there was no God and that religion was simply a tool used by the powerful.  Some said that God was real but had abandoned the Jews.

Near the end came an incredibly powerful and moving moment of the film.  All that had come before was mesmerizing, beautiful, and terrible.  But this moment will remain branded in my mind.

Just as the judges sit to deliver their verdict one final man stands to speak.  He has been silent.  He is a rabbi.  He begins by asking questions about the history of the Jews, posing them mostly to the other rabbi, who is also a judge.  The questions begin with the Exodus and each one challenges the motives of God.  What is so powerful is that this rabbi, who knows his Torah in and out, asks questions that require the listener to question, not what God did, but why he did it.  This rabbi, named Akiba, accepts that God sent the plagues on Egypt and gave the Promised Land over to the Jews.  What he questions, however, is whether this demonstrates God's goodness.  "What of the Egyptian children?" he asks.  "Was the Promised Land empty?"  Then comes the climax of his speech.  He inverts the usual Jewish (and Christian, and Muslim) proclamation that "God is Good!"

"God is not good!" he cries.  "God was never good!  He was only on our side."

That last phrase should be branded onto the hearts and into the minds of every believing person in the entire world.  It reminds us of our great sin.  The belief that because we are on top, because we are winners, because we are prosperous and happy and rich and comfortable, that God must be on our side.  What an evil that sentiment is.  What it requires, as Akiba saw so clearly, is a God who is a son of a bitch.  It requries a vindictive, feckless, hateful, cruel, and wicked diety who's morality is far surpassed by his creation.

God is convicted of breach of covenant.

Then the Germans come.  Half of the men are taken and half left.  As the selected men are taken one of them, a quivering, whimpering man, cries out to Akiba, "What now?  What do we do now that we've convicted God?"  Akiba answers, "Now we pray."  And so the half that are taken and the half that remain are shown praying.  They each hold one hand over their heads because they have no headcoverings.  They pray a liturgical prayer together, witnessing the greatness and mercy of God, and the half that were taken are led naked into a chamber that looks like a shower-room but, of course, is not.

So often artistic attempts to deal with issues like suffering, election, and the nature of God are either reductionist or just stupid.  This, thankfully, is not.  The film takes seriously the problems associated with true evil and suffering, as well as the sometimes paradoxical and even hypocritical nature of faith in God.  For all of that I still felt a sense of hope in the end.  I didn't feel distant from God but drawn to him.  The sense of horror at the sight of those men in that stark "shower" room was balanced with an equal sense of love for their nobility and their faith.

Which Moses?

As I mentioned some time ago, I have recently written a paper on the way that Luke and Paul see and appropriate the character of Moses, particularly in Acts 7 and 2 Corinthians 3.  On Monday I submitted the final revision of that paper.  It is significantly improved from the initial submission but still needs a little bit of work.  I'll see what my professor says when I get it back and if the changes required look reasonable I may reformat it for publication.  In any case, this is one of the reasons blogging has been light lately so I thought it was only fair to reward my handful of loyal readers to read and critique the paper.  If you do bother to read it and have any thoughts, please do let me know.  Even if you think my argument is total bunk, it would still be nice to hear your thoughts.  Follow the URL below to enjoy (or, you know, not).

Toffelmire, Colin.  "Which Moses? An Exploration of the Function of Moses in Acts 7 and 2 Corinthians 3," McMaster Divinity College, 2008.

PS though it seems absurd that I need to make this explicit, I will anyways.  Please note that all content on randomcolin, including academic papers provided by external hyperlink, are the sole property of Colin M. Toffelmire and shall not be reproduced in any form without the express permission of Colin M. Toffelmire.  Brief citations may be used without permission on the condition that such citations include complete and accurate attribution.

A Good Day...

Today was a good day, and until I'd had it I had no idea how badly I've needed it.  As I've shared here a little bit already, PhD studies have been very challenging and the life adjustment involved has been pretty significant.  It hasn't been bad.  In fact Jinny and I love our new town and our new home, and life here has generally been great.

All of that is true, but the one thing that I've been missing is the feeling of triumph.  All of you career students out there know that you really do have to win sometimes.  Sometimes you have to do better than you expected.  Sometimes you need to be told something was excellent.  This is what keeps you going, keeps you thinking that maybe you really do have a contribution to make.

Doctoral programs, however, are not designed to make you feel good.  They are designed to push you, to challenge you, to make you think harder and more deeply than you ever might on your own.  I don't know about other programs but in my first few weeks at McMaster Divinity College I can't count the number of times I heard some variation of "our job is to push you."  Well, the faculty are doing their job and then some.  The very best work I ever did in my M.A. is at best acceptable here.  All of this is important.  I need to be pushed, and as one of my friends reminds me repeatedly, I did pick this path.

But for all of that it still feels nice to win.  Today I got back an assignment from the toughest marker I've ever sat under and it was much better than I'd expected.  That felt great.  Then this afternoon I presented a paper that frankly wasn't fantastic (though the fundamental idea is, I think, great).  I was challenged with some really great constructive criticism, but I also received some very kind words and some affirmation that I was going in a fruitful direction.  Those things may seem like small victories, but quite frankly victories of any kind feel pretty good, so I'll take it.  Only two more significant papers left to write and I'm out of the woods until the Winter semester.  Time to stop celebrating and get my head down again.

Something New...

You'll notice a new blog on the blogroll in the coming days.  It's the outgrowth of an idea I had a long time ago and have been trying to get off the ground in some form or another for years.  Four, Seven, and Twelvefold is a host-blog for a public conversation about the nature and state of evangelical Christianity in North America.  The topics that I hope we'll explore are simply too numerous to mention but if you think a question needs to be asked, then post it in the comments over there or over here and I'll ask it.  Feel free to advertise the new blog in whatever medium is available to you.  The broader and larger the audience, the better the chances that a fruitful and interesting conversation will ensue.

Election Day...

Well, the polls are closed out here in Hamilton but if they're open where you are and you haven't gone to vote yet, get going!  CBC promises the first election results at 10pm ET, which is in about 5 mins, but I don't think I'll stay up to watch.  I personally find the endlessly changing poll numbers rather dull, particularly when I remember that the die is cast and the only really interesting fact left to come is the list of actual winners.  I'm fairly sure that my MP will be the NDP's David Christopher again, though there certainly did seem to be a significant Green party presense around the neighbourhood (if lawn signs mean anything).  As far as who will form the government?  Well if I was forced to guess I'd say another minority Conservative government but I guess we'll see.  In any case, to all of you who are waiting up to see the results, do enjoy the moving numbers.  If you'd like to see them online, check out CBC's interactive election map here.  Looks like the conservatives are in the lead at the moment.

Update:  Well, looks like another Conservative minority indeed.  The hyperlink above will still take you to the main CBC results page, but just in case you're too lazy:

Con.: 143
Lib.: 76 (29 of which, incidentally, are in the GTA)
Bloc: 50
NDP: 37
Gre.: 0

That's a gain of 16 seats for the Conservatives, a loss of 19 for the Liberals, a gain of 7 for the NDP, and a shocking (oh wait, not at all shocking I mean) showing of 0 for the Greens.  In my riding my prediction came true.  We re-elected David Christopher by a fairly stunning 26.2 point margin.  That has to feel nice.

All that's left now is the slightly sexier USAmerican election in a little under a month.  All I can say is that I sure hope it turns out like the polling is suggesting right now.

Election Day...

Well, the polls are closed out here in Hamilton but if they're open where you are and you haven't gone to vote yet, get going!  CBC promises the first election results at 10pm ET, which is in about 5 mins, but I don't think I'll stay up to watch.  I personally find the endlessly changing poll numbers rather dull, particularly when I remember that the die is cast and the only really interesting fact left to come is the list of actual winners.  I'm fairly sure that my MP will be the NDP's David Christopher again, though there certainly did seem to be a significant Green party presense around the neighbourhood (if lawn signs mean anything).  As far as who will form the government?  Well if I was forced to guess I'd say another minority Conservative government but I guess we'll see.  In any case, to all of you who are waiting up to see the results, do enjoy the moving numbers.  If you'd like to see them online, check out CBC's interactive election map here.  Looks like the conservatives are in the lead at the moment.

The GOBM...

I have discovered a new scholarly society, the Guild of Biblical Minimalists (this via Jim West).  I'm still not entirely sure about the precise level of seriousness, but this post for those seeking nominations for the "Billy" award does seem to give a hint.  It is quite an impressive list of scholars, and it appears that joining all but guarantees you some kind of title or office.