Monthly Archives: March 2010

Does the Bible require a free market 3

Continued.

In the first post I mentioned how the Israelites came to have a land ownership heritage that involved each and every family in Israel.  There may have been a problem from the beginning since the first generation of Israelites decided to leave some of the territories unconquered.  I have to assume, though, that the Israelite readiness to leave the Canaanites alone had something to do with their satisfaction with the territory they possessed.  So the likely result was that all the families willingly claimed a smaller territory.  The motivation for the family who won a territory by lot would be that, if he split with another family, then he wouldn’t have to risk his life in war.

So you apparently had a system of hereditary land ownership in which you could lease the land for as much as 50 years but you could not sell or lose it permanently.

Since God gave the land he made rules about it.  Like so:

When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap your field right up to its edge, neither shall you gather the gleanings after your harvest (Leviticus 19.9).

And when you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap your field right up to its edge, nor shall you gather the gleanings after your harvest. You shall leave them for the poor and for the sojourner: I am the Lord your God (Leviticus 23.22).

When you look at the book of Ruth, you see an example of this law in action.  Property owners do seem to have some authority about who gleans (maybe).  It is not clear that there were civil penalties matching these laws.  In the Pentateuch the “laws” include moral instructions.  Sometimes these instructions involve how certain actions may or should be punished, but other times they involve no penalties.

The point, apart from civil sanctions, would be that God leased the land to his people and wanted them to act in a certain way towards others who were needy with that land.  Likewise:

If you go into your neighbor’s vineyard, you may eat your fill of grapes, as many as you wish, but you shall not put any in your bag. If you go into your neighbor’s standing grain, you may pluck the ears with your hand, but you shall not put a sickle to your neighbor’s standing grain (Deuteronomy 23.24-25).

Jesus and his disciples got in trouble for taking advantage of this law on the Sabbath.  I commented on the account in Mark’s Gospel here.

I don’t find anyone wanting to actually follow these laws.  The vast majority of our population would not be helped by them most of the time. People who bring up these laws as an argument against the free market want to use them as license for other kinds of laws that are quite different.

TO BE CONTINUED

Paper is cheap and survives busts

People who think the iPod version of a book will ever sell like an iPod are forgetting economic basics.

Paper is cheap and portable.

iPods work because playing music has always required machines.  Reading has not.  There is no comparison.

From Jesus to James

And now, brothers, I know that you acted in ignorance, as did also your rulers.

via Passage: Acts 3:17 (ESV Bible Online).

People think Jerusalem was judged with destruction because they killed Jesus.

Not true, exactly.

They were judged beause they killed James the Less.  Or Christians in general.

It took about a generation for their sin to mount to the point of provoking judgment.

Jesus had said that his own sentencing and rejection would not be the provocation of judgment:

And everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but the one who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven. And when they bring you before the synagogues and the rulers and the authorities, do not be anxious about how you should defend yourself or what you should say, for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say” (Luke 12.10, 11).

So when Jesus is sentenced to death, he forgives his killers.  But after the testimony of the Spirit through the Church, there is no forgiveness: Jerusalem and the Temple are destroyed.

(See my comments on the story in Mark’s Gospel.)

What if Orianthi sang an Obama v. Ron Paul song?

According to you
I’m stupid
I’m useless
I can’t do anything right

According to you
I’m not able
to decide
not allowed to use my mind
I’m a mess in distress
Can’t have a doctor whose mine
Even if it would save my life
According to you
According to you

But according to him
I’m beautiful and capable
He won’t make me follow his lead
According to him
I’m intelligent and able
Everything I need to be.
Everything is opposite
I don’t feel like stopping it
So baby tell me what I got to lose
He’s into me for everything I’m not
According to you

According to you
I can’t live
My own life
You have to lead me every place

According to you
I suck at buying cars because I don’t give the unions their pay
I’m the girl who does not spend enough
Your investment bankers get what I make
According to you
According to you

But according to him
I’m beautiful and capable
And the bankers should go broke instead.

According to him
I’m intelligent and able
Everything I need to be
Everything is opposite
I don’t feel like stopping it
So baby tell me what I got to lose
He’s into me for everything I’m not
According to you

I need to feel appreciated
like I’m not hated
Oh, no
Why can’t you see me through his eyes?
It’s too bad you’re robbing me dizz-ay

According to me
you’re stupid
you’re useless
you can’t do anything right

But according to him
I’m beautiful, incredible
He can’t get me out of his head

According to him
I’m intelligent and able
Everything I need to be.

YouTube – Orianthi – According To You.

David Chilton talks about worship with his son Nathan

Back in the late eighties or early nineties, this essay from The Reconstruction of the Church really impressed me.  Still does:

The following is a transcript, or at least a reasonably close version, of a series of conversations I had with Nathan, my seven-year-old, as we visited an evangelical church service on a recent Sunday evening. Although the discussion actually took place in several stages (ending late that evening at home), for literary purposes I have reconstructed the conversation as if it all happened during the service. I confess that a good portion of it did go on then, as I tried to explain evangelical worship to an impressionable youngster.

Nathan: Papa, this sure is a funny liturgy.

Papa: Well, it isn’t exactly a liturgy. They don’t believe in liturgy at this church.

Nathan: How can you not believe in liturgy? Isn’t a liturgy just what you do in Church?

Papa: Yes. But what I mean is that they don’t believe in having the service written down in advance.

Nathan: Why not?

Papa: They think that if they read something that’s written down, they won’t really mean it.

Nathan: But all they have to do is think about what it means, and agree with it, and then they’ll mean it, won’t they?

Papa: Sure. But they don’t believe that.

Nathan: But somebody around here must believe it, because we all sang from the same hymnbook. Don’t they mean it when they sing the hymns?

Papa: Sure they do. But they think prayers are different.

Nathan: You mean that they can agree with a song that they read, but they don’t know how to agree with a prayer that they read?

Papa: Something like that.

Nathan: Then why don’t they just memorize the prayers?

Papa: Because they think they wouldn’t mean those, either.

Nathan: Can they memorize songs and mean them?

Papa: Sure. But they think music is different. You can read or memorize a song and still mean it. But if you read or memorize words without music, you won’t mean them.

Nathan: But don’t they teach their children “politeness liturgies”? Like “please” and “thank you” and “you’re welcome ,“ and ‘yes, sir,” and ‘yes, ma’am”? And don’t they teach them to mean it?

Papa: Yes, but –

Nathan: And what about Bible verses? Do they memorize Bible verses?

Papa: Of course they do.

Nathan: But they don’t mean them?

Papa: Yes, they do.

Nathan: Without music?

Papa: Sure.

Nathan: How?

Papa: Can we change the subject?

Nathan: OK. Why didn’t we confess our sins when we began the service?

Papa: This church doesn’t believe in it.

Nathan: WHAT? !

Papa: Shhh. Keep your voice down. I mean they don’t think the Church needs to do it.

Nathan: Don’t we need to be forgiven?

Papa: Sure. They just don’t think it should happen in Church.

Nathan: What about the Creed? Why didn’t we say the Creed?

Papa: Well, partly because it’s liturgical. They think they won’t mean it if they say it.

Nathan: We could sing it.

Papa: They don’t know how.

Nathan: Oh – they haven’t been Christians very long, huh? Let’s teach it to them.

Papa: Let’s not.

Nathan: Why not?

Papa: Because they won’t want to do it anyway. Because it’s liturgical.

Nathan: Why are they so afraid of liturgy? We could explain that it isn’t hard to mean it when you say it.

Papa: But they won’t want to do it anyway. They want to be different every week.

Nathan: Really? Different every week?

Papa: Yes.

Nathan: What do they do differently? Do they sometimes take the offering at the end of the service instead of in the middle?

Papa: No. That’s always at the same time.

Nathan: Do they sometimes have the preaching at the beginning?

Papa: No, that’s at the same time too.

Nathan: Then what do they do that’s different?

Papa: They sing different songs.

Nathan: So does our church.

Papa: Well, it really comes down to the fact that they don’t have prayers and responses for the congregation to read.

Nathan: Why not?

Papa: They think that reading prayers and responses keeps people from worshiping.

Nathan: Really? What do they think the people should do in- stead?

Papa: Just sit there and do nothing.

Nathan: That’s worship? Doesn’t it get boring?

Papa: Not if the elders keep things exciting enough on the stage.

Nathan: Elders? What elders? You mean those men up there on the platform are elders?

Papa: Sort of. But they don’t always call them that.

Nathan: Why aren’t they wearing robes and collars so you know what they are?

Papa: They say elders shouldn’t wear special clothes.

Nathan: Why not?

Papa: They think that there’s nothing special about clothing.

Nathan: Policemen and soldiers and judges wear special clothes.

Papa: Well, they think clothing isn’t special for elders. They think elders should look like everybody else.

Nathan: Then why is that elder wearing a maroon suit with a blue shirt, a green tie, and a white belt?

Papa: Well, it’s still a suit. The point is, he can wear anything he wants.

Nathan: You mean an elder could wear a robe and a collar if he wanted?

Papa: No. He can wear anything but a robe and a collar.

Nathan: So they do think clothing is special!

Papa: Well. . . .

Nathan: There! Someone did it again!

Papa: Did what?

Nathan: He said “Amen.” See? That’s why this place needs a liturgy book. Half the people don’t know when to say things.

Papa: I told you. They don’t do a liturgy here.

Nathan: Some people do. Hear that? Somebody just did it again. If we had a book, we could all say it together. That would keep some people from getting it wrong and saying it while somebody else is talking.

Papa: But Nathan, I’m telling you. There’s no liturgy. People just say “Amen” whenever they feel like it.

Nathan: WHAT? Where does the Bible say to do that?

Papa: It doesn’t.

Nathan: Then why do they do it? Aren’t they afraid?

Papa: Why should they be afraid?

Nathan: Because it’s a vow, a covenant promise. Doesn’t it mean that we agree with God, and that if we don’t keep this promise we are asking God to destroy us? Isn’t it even a special covenant name for Jesus?

Papa: Sure. But they don’t know that. They think it means something else.

Nathan: What do they think “Amen” means?

Papa: They think it means “I feel good.”

Nathan: Look at that!

Papa: What?

Nathan: There are people raising their hands!

Papa: So?

Nathan: In our church, the elders raise their hands to God when they pray. But in this church, everybody else does it, whenever they feel like it. And they make up their own liturgy as they go along, You know what I think?

Papa: What?

Nathan: I think that in this church everybody is an elder-–except the elders.

Papa: That may be the best description I’ve heard yet.

Nathan: You know, Pa, those elders are tricking us.

Papa: How’s that?

Nathan: They really do have a liturgy for their prayers. They keep saying the same thing over and over again.

Papa: Really?

Nathan: Sure. I don’t know what they mean, but there are two special words they keep using in all their prayers.

Papa: What words?

Nathan: Well, the first one is “just.” They keep saying it. “Lord we just thank you for just being so just special.” Stuff like that. They must have it written down,

because they all do it.

Papa: What’s the other word?

Nathan: It’S not really a word. It’s a special sound, like a little clucking noise: “Tsk.”

Papa: What?

Nathan: Tsk. Tsk.

Papa: What are you talking about?

Nathan: Listen. It goes like this: “Lord, tsk, we just, tsk, we just, tsk, we want to, tsk, thank you, tsk, Lord, for, tsk, for just, tsk, being just so, tsk, special, tsk.” Right?

Papa: OK, quiet down and listen to the special music.

Nathan: Wait. What’s that guy doing? He looks weird.

Papa: Shhh. He’s just singing.

Nathan: Yeah, but he’s shaking all over the place. He looks like he’s going to fall down.

Papa: Well, that’s the way the “special music” singers do it in this church. He’s just trying to rock to the beat.

Nathan: Why? It looks dumb.

Papa: Let’s figure it out. Why do we have a choir in our church? What do you think they’re doing there?

Nathan: It’s part of our worship. They help us worship God.

Papa: OK. Now, why do you think this church has people sing?

Nathan: Well, I guess they’re trying to worship too. But it seems more like they’re trying to look like they’re on television.

Papa: Sort of like MTV?

Nathan: Not that bad. It just looks like they want people to notice them instead of praying. Unless — Do you think maybe he’s just kind of sick?

Papa: We’ll talk about it later. It’s time for communion now.

Nathan: What’s this?

Papa: Shhh! It’s bread.

Nathan: Come on, Pa. What is it really?

Papa: It’s bread, honest. It’s a little, tiny cube of bread.

Nathan: Looks like a piece of cracker to me.

Papa: Well, sure. It is a piece of cracker.

Nathan: Should we give them some money so they can afford bread?

Papa: They can afford it. But they want to do it this way.

Nathan: Why would anybody want to eat this? Do they like the taste?

Papa: Probably not.

Nathan: Then why would they eat something they don’t enjoy–especially at Communion? We’re supposed to be happy when we eat with God.

Papa: Be quiet. It’s time to drink the cup.

Nathan: OK. Yuck! What is this stuff?

Papa: Um, it’s. . . .

Nathan: Tastes like grape-flavored Kool-Aid.

Papa: Grape juice, probably.

Nathan: Doesn’t taste very good. Did they forget to buy some wine?

Papa: No. They don’t drink wine here.

Nathan: WHAT?!

Papa: SHHH!

Nathan: Why don’t they drink wine?

Papa: They don’t believe in it. They think it’s wrong.

Nathan: But it tastes good.

Papa: Well, tasting good isn’t everything.

Nathan: But God made it for us to drink, especially at Communion. It makes us happy, and it makes God happy too.

Papa: That’s right.

Nathan: Does the Bible say it’s wrong?

Papa: No.

Nathan: Then why do they say it is? And why do they drink this yucky juice? And eat those crummy little cracker pieces? No wonder they’re so sad!

Papa: What?

Nathan: Well, look at them. Look how sad they all are. They don’t look like they’re enjoying this, do they?

Papa: Well, no. . . .

Nathan: Well, they aren’t enjoying it a bit. But didn’t you tell me that Communion is a special dinner with Jesus?

Papa: Yes.

Nathan: And when we come to Communion, the whole Church is coming up to heaven, right?

Papa: Right.

Nathan: And when we go to heaven to be with Jesus and have dinner with Him, we’re supposed to be happy, aren’t we?

Papa: Sure.

Nathan: Well, why aren’t these people happy? Do they think heaven is a sad place to be?

Papa: I think they’re sad because they’re thinking about their sins.

Nathan: But they’ve been forgiven, and now they’re in heaven! They’re supposed to be thinking about Jesus!

Papa: Oh, they’re thinking of Him, too. They’re sad because they’re thinking about Him dying on the cross.

Nathan: But He’s not dying anymore. The whole reason we’re doing this is that He came alive, right?

Papa: Right.

Nathan: Well, I don’t think they could be sad about Jesus. I think they’re sad ‘cause they had to eat those icky crackers and drink that dumb old Kool-Aid.

Papa: Grape juice.

Nathan: Kool-Aid. Hey,

Papa. Why are those people looking at me funny?

Papa: Um . . . it’s because you took Communion.

Nathan: So? Everybody else did.

Papa: Not the kids.

Nathan: Why not?

Papa: Because they aren’t allowed to.

Nathan: WHAT?!

Papa: SHHH! They only let grownups take Communion at this church.

Nathan: Why? If you’ve been baptized you can take Communion, right? Even babies can take Communion, because Jesus feeds them, too. Children need Communion as much as grownups.

Papa: But these children haven’t been baptized.

Nathan: WHAT?!

Papa: Shhh. It’s true,

Nathan: Why don’t they want their children to come into the Covenant?

Papa: Well, they do. They just don’t believe that children can be Christians until they get older.

Nathan: That’s dumb. God can make anybody a Christian.

Papa: Well, I mean that they don’t think He will make their children Christians. Until they get older.

Nathan: But Jesus wants little children to come to Him. Even babies. He said so, didn’t He?

Papa: Yes.

Nathan: Look. These people have families, right? Don’t they feed their babies? They don’t make their kids sit in a corner and wait till they’re grownups before they can eat. So why shouldn’t God feed His children, too? It must be sad for the kids to watch the rest of the family eating without them.

Papa: But they don’t think their children really are God’s children.

Nathan: But they teach their children to pray, don’t they?

Papa: Sure.

Nathan: Who do they pray to?

Papa: “Whom.” Objective case. And don’t end your sentences with prepositions unless you have to.

Nathan: Do their kids call God “Father”? Like in the Lord’s Prayer? Wait a minute. You aren’t going to tell me they don’t believe in the Lord’s Prayer, are you?

Papa: Sure, they believe in it. And many of them teach it to their children.

Nathan: Well then. If they teach their children to say “Our Father” then that means they think their children are God’s children, too. Right?

Papa: Uh . . . sort of. But–

Nathan: But they don’t baptize them into Jesus. So how can they be God’s children unless they’re in the Covenant?

Papa: Right. That’s why they don’t give them Communion.

Nathan: Is this as confusing to them as it is to me?

Papa: It might be if they thought about it much.

Nathan: Well, how are their kids supposed to become Christians, if their parents don’t bring them to be baptized?

Papa: When they get older, they’re supposed to makeup their own minds.

Nathan: About whether or not to obey God? That’s pretty dumb. Do they have to wait till they’re older to decide if they want to obey their parents, too?

Papa: Not usually. But they want their children to wait until they’re old enough to love God.

Nathan: But I love God. I always have. And the Bible says that people can know God even when they’re in their mama’s tummy, doesn’t it?

Papa: Well, these people think you have to wait until you are older and smarter, so that you understand what it’s all about.

Nathan: You mean you can’t have dinner with Jesus until you understand what it means?

Papa: That’s the idea.

Nathan: Papa, do grownups understand everything about what Communion means?

Papa: Some people probably think they do.

Nathan: I don’t think these people understand much about it. If they did, they’d bring their children into the Covenant and let them have dinner in heaven with them. And anyway, how are the kids supposed to learn what it means without doing it? That’s like trying to get nutrition from reading a recipe, instead of eating the food.

Papa: Not bad. I’ll have to remember that one.

Nathan: OK, so how can a kid get Communion in this church?

Papa: Well, when he gets older–say, around twelve or so–he asks Jesus into his heart.

Nathan: Papa, don’t be silly. This is serious.

Papa: I’m not being silly. They tell you to ask Jesus to come into your heart.

Nathan: I’ve never heard that. Is that in the Bible?

Papa: No. But they think it is. It’s just an expression someone made up that means becoming a Christian. They also call it “receiving Christ,” which is a little more Biblical.

Nathan: But Jesus is in heaven, and we receive him every Sunday–every time we eat His body and drink His blood.

Papa: Uh, keep your voice down, willya? They don’t talk like that around here.

Nathan: But Jesus talked like that.

Papa: I know. But they don’t know that.

Nathan: Let’s tell them.

Papa: Let’s not, OK? Not right now.

Nathan: All right. Let’s get back to how kids can become Christians and have Communion. When they get older they ask Jesus “into their hearts,“ right? So do they just go ahead and do it when they get to be twelve?

Papa: Not exactly. The grownups have to be sure the kids really mean it.

Nathan: How can they know that?

Papa: The kids have to cry when they do it.

Nathan: Cry? Real tears? How do they make themselves cry?

Papa: Well, some churches spend lots of time practicing. But, basically, they just have a preacher get up and tell real sad stories, so sad that they make people cry. So then the kids cry, and they walk up to the front of the church and ask Jesus to come into their hearts. Sometimes this happens during the summer. The kids go to a special camp where they listen to people preach at them. Then, on the last night, they all stand around a campfire and —

Nathan: And listen to scary stories?

Papa: No. Sad stories.

Nathan: Aw, shoot.

Papa: Then they cry, and throw little twigs on the fire, and ask Jesus into their hearts.

Nathan: Why do they throw twigs on the fire? Do they think they have to do that to come into the Covenant?

Papa: They think that’s how you have to do it if you’re in the mountains. It’s part of their Summer Camp Liturgy. But if you’re home you don’t need to.

Nathan: Then do they get Communion?

Papa: No. They usually have to wait, and go through a class to learn what it means to be a Christian.

Nathan: Wait. What have they been doing while growing up? Haven’t they already had plenty of classes? Does a kid ever get Communion around here?

Papa: Sure, eventually. After he gets out of the class he can have it whenever everybody else does.

Nathan: Every Sunday.

Papa: No. Every month or so.

Nathan: Why not every Sunday? Don’t they go to church every Sunday?

Papa: Yes. But they don’t have Communion every Sunday.

Nathan: But what do they do, if they don’t have Communion? Isn’t that why we go to Church–so we can go to heaven and have dinner in Jesus’ House?

Papa: Well, they sing songs and listen to a sermon.

Nathan: But that’s part of the Liturgy of Communion. Communion is what the Church service is all about, isn’t it? We’re supposed to worship God, and then He feeds us with His food. Why do they go to church? Don’t they go to meet God?

Papa: Sure. But they think they meet him by just listening to a sermon and getting excited about what the preacher says, if he’s interesting enough to listen to. If he isn’t a good speaker, then they think they haven’t met with God.

Nathan: Look. Don’t these people know that Communion makes them strong for living the rest of the week? How is anyone supposed to go without food for a month and still have any energy to do his work?

Papa: Well, they think that if they have Communion every week it won’t seem special.

Nathan: It doesn’t seem like it’s very special to them anyway. I think it would be lots more special if they had it every week and gave it to their children. Maybe then even the grownups would understand what it means.

Papa: You’re probably right.

Nathan: Wait a minute. I think I just figured out the real reason why they don’t have Communion very often.

Papa: Why’s that?

Nathan: ‘Cause it’s crackers and Kool-Aid.

Maybe Krugman is right: Obamacare is Heritagecare

Krugman writes:

Bruce Bartlett asserts that AEI has muzzled its health-care experts, because the truth is that they agree with a lot of what Obama is proposing. I find this quite believable; back in 2003 Stuart Butler of the Heritage Foundation, which is supposedly harder-right than AEI, proposed a health care reform consisting of … drumroll … an individual mandate coupled with subsidies to make insurance affordable. In short, Obamacare.

If Krugman is right, then I think it presents us with an object lesson that was articulated here:

Krugman thinks this is an argument for Obamacare, but I see it as another reason not to trust conservatives on questions of economic liberty. During the Bush years, conservative think tanks advocated the unconstitutional individual mandate and subsidies? Of course they did. No surprise here. After all, social democracy is simply soft corporatist fascism, with a different emphasis.

Eugene Peterson on Identity

“I encounter such constant and widespread lying about reality each day and meet with such skilled and systematic distortion of the truth that I’m always in danger of losing my grip on reality. The reality, of course, is that God is sovereign and Christ is savior. The reality is that prayer is my mother tongue and the eucharist my basic food. The reality is that baptism, not Myers-Briggs, defines who I am.”

via Eugene Peterson on Identity « Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam.

Does the Bible require a free market? 2

Continued

I should mention how much free market romanticism is detrimental to sustaining a free market ethic.  The fact that the most direct way to establish property rights is by a prohibition on stealing and one on coveting should indicate that living within the restraints of a free market is not always a satisfying endeavor.  The libertarian impulse to equate the free market with sleeping around is delusional.  It is more like monogamy; you have to stay with what is yours and not wander.  It isn’t an accident that the restriction on stealing in the Ten Commandments is next to the prohibition of adultery.

But I’m not really concerned about an attempt to form a civilization around legalized prostitution.  I’m talking about free-market boosterism that preaches riches for all.

Can’t happen.

Yes, everyone’s standard of living can go up overtime in a free society.

But that is far different and a much less attractive claim.  It is more pleasant to dwell on the less common rags to riches stories and then pretend that what happened was entirely due to personal ability or commitment.

But not everyone can be rich at the same time because “rich” is, by definition, an observation that someone is above the economic average.

It is delusional to use “rags to riches” stories to get around this fact.  People with great ability and commitment do not necessarily find a way to make a fortune.  And many do come into a fortune without such ability or commitment.

So the possibility of “the American Dream” needs to be left out of any explanation of a free market. The false promise of “the American Dream” leads to politically manufactured booms that end in busts and lead to corporate fascism and then socialism.

Philippus Jacobus Hoedemaker vs. Abraham kuyper « Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam

Hoedemaker did not win the day with his theocratic principles, as Reuben Alvarado demonstrates in his 1992 lecture at the BH Conference. Hoedemaker stood firmly against Abraham Kuyper’s political pluralism. Even though Kuyper has been immensely helpful in bringing a thoroughness/completeness to the application of the Lordship of Christ in all areas of life, yet he failed to argue for the thoroughness/completeness of Christ’s Lordship in the political sphere. Hoedemaker, on the other hand, understood that if “antithesis” were faithfully applied then neutrality could not exist. To use Gary North’s terminology, Kuyper held to political polytheism, while Hoedemaker was the true theocrat in the Dutch Calvinist tradition. As Alvarado concludes, the Hoedemakerites are finally addressing the inconsistencies of Kuyper.

via Philippus Jacobus Hoedemaker vs. Abraham kuyper « Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam.