In Recovering Hegel from the Critique of Leo Strauss, Sara MacDonald and Barry Craig provide a study unique in its focus on Leo Strauss’s reading of Hegel. While MacDonald and Craig find value in Strauss’s thought, they argue that his pessimism concerning modernity lies in a misunderstanding of both modernity’s greatest philosophical advocate, G.W.F. Hegel, and modernity’s virtues.

Craig, Barry M As we return from the Lent-Easter cycle to Ordinary Time, the last Sunday of which was the Sixth, on 15 February, we pick up on the Eleventh Sunday and so miss chapters 2 and 3 of Mark. For six Sundays this quarter we will read from chapters 4 to 6, but at the point of his first account of the feeding of a multitude we will switch to John to lead into the four Sundays of his Bread (...) of Life discourse - a valuable detour, but one that inhibits a more thorough reading of Mark. (shrink)

Craig, Barry M A characteristic feature of Luke's Gospel is that of the journey, with Jesus from chapter 9 resolutely heading to Jerusalem; of the more than eighty verses naming Jerusalem in the New Testament only a handful are not in Luke-Acts. Last Sunday's gospel reading was taken from the last day of teaching given after entering Jerusalem and reclaiming the Temple, and before the Passover and arrest. But Jesus is not the only one to whom the journey motif applies. (...) Last Sunday reference was made to the Son of Man coming in power, and the exhortation to the disciples to stand ready is akin to that of people prepared for a journey. Today we return to just before the commencement of the public ministry, with John the Baptist exhorting people to prepare a way for the Lord. A simple reading of this text suggests that it is the way on which God proceeds that needs making straight, but it is not: it refers to the path on which those God rescues are brought in procession. This is the procession referred to in the second reading, for which mountains are levelled and the valleys filled so that Jerusalem's captive children may be brought back safely from the land of bondage, Babylon. (shrink)

Craig, Barry M The combination of 'the eyes of the blind shall be opened' in Isaiah 35:5 and the psalm's 'the Lord gives sight to the blind' seems to be preparing the way for an account of the restoration of sight in the gospel, but its focus is instead on restoring hearing and speech. In this story, which is shared with Matthew, as with the raising of the young girl told also by Matthew and Luke, Mark alone reports the Lord's (...) command in Aramaic. In this case the Lord's word is transmitted in Greek transliteration as Ephphatha, but correctly it should be Ethphathach. The mispronunciation perhaps points to a particular fascination with the Lord's own words in Mark's Greek-speaking circles, and also to the attribution of magical power to such words that may then be borrowed in magical folk-medicine; think similarly of the conjectured origin of Hocus pocus in Hoc est Corpus from Mass in Latin. However, the Aramaic word is richly connected to the mission of Jesus. In the first reading, the Hebrew has two synonymous verbs in verse 5 for opening, respectively applied to the eyes of the blind and the ears of the deaf. The first is not common and is always said of eyes, except in Isaiah 42:20, where it is used of ears. The second verb is common and refers to the opening of eyes and ears and mouths, but also to the untying of cords and to setting free. This is clear in the Syriac Peshitta's use of a single verb for both Hebrew verbs in Isaiah and the word Mark reports Jesus using, where it is applicable both to opening the man's ears to hear and to freeing his tongue to speak clearly. The Septuagint's version of Isaiah has 'will hear' instead of the Hebrew's second verb, 'will be opened', while the added translation in Mark matches only the Septuagint's translation of Isaiah's first verb. That Greek verb is fitting only for the ears, not for the tongue, so that the man's becoming able to speak clearly seems to be merely a consequence of the miraculous opening of his ears. Reading both passages via the Syriac, and reading them in parallel as the Lectionary has us do today, reveals the gospel encounter to be more than simply a story of a healing: the episode points to Christ's redeeming mission as being one of liberating, the scene becoming a fulfilment of Isaiah's prophetic passage in a demonstration of Christ's mission in the flesh and in the life of an actual person. Furthermore, Mark's transmission of the Aramaic commands Ethphathach and Kum in 5:41, together sum up Christ's twofold work: to redeem and raise those doomed to die. Both stories show this at work in the here and now of people's lives and not merely as a future hope for the end of time. If our mission as Church is to continue Christ's work, then it is likewise to be carried out among people in our own time. Thus the historical impetus to establish such works as schools, since education sets free from ignorance, and hospitals, since curing the sick frees them from ills or caring for them brings relief in time of suffering. But we should not think only in such institutional modes; not every parish can or should establish a school or hospital or hospice, or other such major works, but the question remains for each: What does this community do to proclaim Christ's saving mission in the lives of real people both near and far? (shrink)

Craig, Barry M Today's gospel reading includes one of the eleven parables unique to Luke; it is also one of the most well known, and is often said to be misnamed in its common designation as the Prodigal Son. Many parables are similarly named in ways that appear to miss the point of their telling, but this tendency actually points to how we engage with all stories, and the power of Christ's storytelling. We need to realise that the mind does (...) not distinguish between reality and fiction, for all viewing and understanding of the world takes place in our heads. Thus we respond emotionally and even physically in the same way to what we see unfolding, be it real-time events in the world or depicted events, historical or fictional, as mediated by actors and machinery at the movies. In the same way, we do not distinguish between reports of actual happenings and fictional stories. Should there be any doubt about this, ask yourself: Have I ever cried at a movie, or laughed, or grown angry, or felt anything, or ducked, jumped or reacted in any way at all? At a recent viewing of Les Miserables someone at the end of the row was overcome with uncontrollable sobbing as the movie drew to an end. This distraction provided suitable cover for not a few people to sneak hankies out of pockets and return them before lights returned. If we did not respond to movies there would be no point in seeing them. Similarly with novels. They are also fodder for our imaginations, where we in a sense try on the experiences of others, imaginatively inhabiting the bodies and feelings of others. This is the basis of empathy, and the source of the power of storytelling. (shrink)

Craig, Barry M Our last Sunday in Ordinary Time before Lent was the Fifth ; we were in Luke's fifth chapter when the first disciples were called. We now return to the Sundays in Ordinary Time, picking up on the Tenth Sunday and two chapters later, and so we begin our first sustained reading from Luke's gospel, chapters 7 to 14, but skip all but the opening verses of chapter 8. Jesus' Galilean ministry occupies until the end of chapter 9, (...) then he begins the procession to Jerusalem, during which various teachings are located without being specific to the journey. (shrink)

Craig, Barry M As we return from the Lent-Easter cycle to Ordinary Time, the last Sunday of which was the Sixth, on 15 February, we pick up on the Eleventh Sunday and so miss chapters 2 and 3 of Mark. For six Sundays this quarter we will read from chapters 4 to 6, but at the point of his first account of the feeding of a multitude we will switch to John to lead into the four Sundays of his Bread (...) of Life discourse - a valuable detour, but one that inhibits a more thorough reading of Mark. (shrink)

Craig, Barry M Several solemnities fall on Sundays this year, displacing the usual readings and prayers. Three occur in this period, Sundays 24, 31 and 32, giving way respectively to Exaltation of the Holy Cross, All Saints and Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed, and Dedication of the Lateran Basilica. A further complication is that All Saints outranks All Souls, so Mass on Saturday evening is of All Saints, not of All Souls, just as when Christmas falls on a Saturday, (...) the evening Mass is of Christmas not the Holy Family. This results in disruption to the Lectionary, and some repetitions. For Holy Cross, the second reading, which is also read on Good Friday, reappears two weeks later unless the shorter form is used; and the gospel was part of that read on Trinity Sunday. On All Souls readings are to be chosen from the Lectionary's provision for Masses for the Dead. For convenience, a set is provided in the Sunday book, but its first reading repeats all but the last phrase from three weeks earlier, and much of the second reading was read on the third Sunday in Lent, while the gospel has also already been read. So, for All Souls this year parishes are advised to exercise the prerogative to choose readings, for which reason no reflection can be given here that may cover all. (shrink)

Craig, Barry M The season of Advent is not well-defined as it flows almost seamlessly from the end-time themes of the Sundays late in Ordinary Time and turns to the approaching Nativity of Christ. Lacking an event-defining start, Advent in the Roman Rite is named as the four Sundays before Christmas, thus lasting twentyone to twenty-eight days, while in the Ambrosian Rite of Milan it is six Sundays. The elements common to each Sunday's gospel reading in the Roman Rite's three-year (...) Lectionary reveal this sequence: Stay awake; John the Baptist is a voice crying in the wilderness 'Prepare a way for the Lord'; John the Baptist is a witness to Christ; Annunciation to Joseph, or to Mary, or the Visitation -in any case Mary is with child. Although this year, B, we follow the Gospel according to Mark, after reading its opening on the Second Sunday of Advent we do not read from it again until the feast of the Baptism of the Lord. Thus the Lectionary for Advent and Christmastide presents a melange of all four Gospels, with Mark the least represented. This is unavoidable since Mark provides no information from before the emergence of Jesus in his public ministry. However, homilists need to remember that this socalled year of Mark will have several interruptions from John's Gospel. (shrink)

Craig, Barry M Review of: Vatican council II: Reforming liturgy, by Carmel Pilcher, David Orr and Elizabeth Harrington, eds., pp. xxviii + 307, $49.95.