Monthly Archives: December 2010

Son, Savior, Faith, Justification

So the first promise of a son is a promise of a savior. God said to the serpent:

I will put enmity between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and her offspring;
he shall bruise your head,
and you shall bruise his heel.

This was important to Eve. She thought her first son might be the fulfillment of the promise: “Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, ‘I have gotten a man with the help of the Lord.'” But she struggled. First son exiled for murder. Second son killed by his brother. Finally a third:

And Adam knew his wife again, and she bore a son and called his name Seth, for she said, “God has appointed for me another offspring instead of Abel, for Cain killed him.” To Seth also a son was born, and he called his name Enosh. At that time people began to call upon the name of the Lord.

Jump ahead to Abraham. The promise of a son with the promise of victory over the enemy is repeated:

After these things the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision: “Fear not, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.” But Abram said, “O LORD God, what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?” And Abram said, “Behold, you have given me no offspring, and a member of my household will be my heir.” And behold, the word of the LORD came to him: “This man shall not be your heir; your very own son shall be your heir.” And he brought him outside and said, “Look toward heaven, and number the stars, if you are able to number them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” And he believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness.

So Abraham believing God’s word and being justified by faith is found in his believing the promise from God that He will provide a son. And in this promise God goes on to make a covenant with Abraham, a promise which includes the defeat of enemies. In fact, this victory is described in judicial language. God will condemn the new “serpent” and thus vindicate or justify his people:

Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years. But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions. As for yourself, you shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried in a good old age. And they shall come back here in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.

When God fulfilled this promise in the Exodus from Egypt he interpreted it as this passing of judicial sentence, saying, “For I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and I will strike all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and on all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the LORD” (Exodus 12.12). And again:

On the day after the Passover, the people of Israel went out triumphantly in the sight of all the Egyptians, while the Egyptians were burying all their firstborn, whom the Lord had struck down among them. On their gods also the Lord executed judgments (Numbers 33.3b-4).

So when God promises Hannah the barren second wife of Elkanah a son, she sees this as the portent of a world revolution in her society:

My heart exults in the Lord;
my strength is exalted in the Lord.
My mouth derides my enemies,
because I rejoice in your salvation.

There is none holy like the Lord;
there is none besides you;
there is no rock like our God.
Talk no more so very proudly,
let not arrogance come from your mouth;
for the Lord is a God of knowledge,
and by him actions are weighed.
The bows of the mighty are broken,
but the feeble bind on strength.
Those who were full have hired themselves out for bread,
but those who were hungry have ceased to hunger.
The barren has borne seven,
but she who has many children is forlorn.
The Lord kills and brings to life;
he brings down to Sheol and raises up.
The Lord makes poor and makes rich;
he brings low and he exalts.
He raises up the poor from the dust;
he lifts the needy from the ash heap
to make them sit with princes
and inherit a seat of honor.
For the pillars of the earth are the Lord’s,
and on them he has set the world.

He will guard the feet of his faithful ones,
but the wicked shall be cut off in darkness,
for not by might shall a man prevail.
The adversaries of the Lord shall be broken to pieces;
against them he will thunder in heaven.
The Lord will judge the ends of the earth;
he will give strength to his king
and exalt the power of his anointed.

Mary too follows in this tradition. Since she is told that her son will be a king, her song is not as surprising to us. But given the precedent of Hannah’s song, Mary might have sung much of it as she did without such knowledge:

My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant.
For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
And his mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;
he has brought down the mighty from their thrones
and exalted those of humble estate;
he has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.
He has helped his servant Israel,
in remembrance of his mercy,
as he spoke to our fathers,
to Abraham and to his offspring forever.

The last part of Mary’s song recalls Abraham’s own worries about having a child and the implications of God’s promise to him. Abraham is promises a son and deliverance from the powers. Mary is promised a son and knows it means deliverance from the powers. Abraham’s faith is counted as righteousness. Mary is blessed in her faith, as Elizabeth says: “blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord.”

And Paul agrees that this is all about justification by faith:

For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be heir of the world did not come through the law but through the righteousness of faith. For if it is those of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. For the law brings wrath, but where there is no law there is no transgression.

That is why it is of faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his offspring—not only to the one of the law but also to the one who shares the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all, as it is written, “I have made you the father of many nations”—in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been told, “So shall your offspring be.” He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead (since he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah’s womb. No distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. That is why his faith was “counted to him as righteousness.” But the words “it was counted to him” were not written for his sake alone, but for ours also. It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.

Celebrating the falsity of R2K “theology”

Joy to the World , the Lord is come!
Let earth receive her King;
Let every heart prepare Him room,
And Heaven and nature sing,
And Heaven and nature sing,
And Heaven, and Heaven, and nature sing.

Joy to the World, the Savior reigns!
Let men their songs employ;
While fields and floods, rocks, hills and plains
Repeat the sounding joy,
Repeat the sounding joy,
Repeat, repeat, the sounding joy.

No more let sins and sorrows grow,
Nor thorns infest the ground;
He comes to make His blessings flow
Far as the curse is found,
Far as the curse is found,
Far as, far as, the curse is found.

He rules the world with truth and grace,
And makes the nations prove
The glories of His righteousness,
And wonders of His love,
And wonders of His love,
And wonders, wonders, of His love.

Of course, I’m joking to an extent. We’re really celebrating the birth and reign of the king of the world. The falsity of Radical Two Kingdom theology is simply a consequence of loyalty to Him.

Rethinking Thin

Rethinking Thin: The New Science of Weight Loss--and the Myths and Realities of DietingRethinking Thin: The New Science of Weight Loss–and the Myths and Realities of Dieting by Gina Kolata

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book is much less angry and lyrical than Paul Campos’ The Obesity Myth, but it is just as powerful, partly because it takes the reader by surprise. Even the title, “Rethinking Thin,” seems designed to lull the complacent who are going to be confronted with the need to rethink fat. And, it saves its best ammo for the end. Not only is weight loss rarely possible in the way it is advertised, not only are the causes unknown, but the best evidence is that heftier people are healthier than the skinny. The mortality rates are U shaped with overweight in the middle of the valley and the thin and extreme obese at the higher ends (where a rise indicates greater mortality).

This book is never boring, but if you at all know that you like human interest stories, you can be confident that you will find Kolata’s writing fascinating. Also, this is the first book I’ve found that gives some historical/cultural information about when and how views of fat changed in American life. It is all fascinating.

I didn’t give this book five stars because I wasn’t happy with some aspects of Kolata’s happy ending. I think the people who learned to exercise more, eat more healthy, snack less between meals, and accept the results without trying to become skinny, were inspiring. But in that mix Kolata included people obsessed with calorie counts who instinctively interpreted food as caloric numbers. I don’t think that is mentally healthy. (I’d only take off a fraction of a star if that were possible.)

Kolata’s book is short, engaging, and disruptive to the superstitious world in which she lives we live [not sure why I wrote “she lives” originally]. One of her stories involved a statistician in the 1800s who discovered that bleeding did not help the diseases it was supposed to help. He immediately reported that this proved people weren’t being bled soon enough or as much as they needed to be. That is the world we live in today regarding health and fat. All the best evidence is that we are actually hurting ourselves but the thin-regime will never give up the political and economic power they have.

Take it away from them.

View all my reviews

Buffy the Vampire Slayer S1 E12 “Prophecy Girl” and Paul’s Gospel in Romans (Part Two)

So The Master has ascended and Buffy is dead.

But that’s not how the story ends. Two friends were following Buffy hoping to help her in some way. They arrive in the underground lair seconds after the Master has blasted his way to the surface. There lies Buffy face down in a pool of water.

It turns out that The Master gained great strength from Buffy’s blood and had not drained her of a life threatening amount. Rather, Buffy drowned when she fell into the water. One of Buffy’s friends resuscitates her. She suddenly opens her eyes, inhales, and coughs up water.

While the rationale is excessively lame, I have to point out that, of the two friends, it is not the superpowered one who is able to revive her. Rather, the normal humble one gives life. This is not actually consistent with the themes I’m pointing to in this post, but it does have it’s own Gospel dynamic. It is emphasized in the climax of season 6 when Buffy’s powers are useless but a normal carpenter saves the world by being willing to die.

In any case: strangely, she does not feel weakened. She feels stronger.  The initial sequence of Buffy being knocked down and getting back up seems to have been emblematic of her dual with The Master. Having new life she returns to the surface to confront The Master. She finds him on a rooftop. While in the underground cavern he had used the shadows to hide and ambush Buffy, here there was no way to play such tricks. They can only fight and Buffy wins, throwing the vampire down to the ground where a convenient sharp wooden branch penetrates his heart.

So there are two dynamics here. One is obvious to my Christian and many non-Christian readers: Buffy dies and rises and is thus able to defeat evil.

But the other dynamic is what I want to focus on: Buffy, by her dying, liberates and empowers the evil so that it can finally be dealt with once and for all. That was the despair-inducing truth that the Master boasted in before he bit her: that it was precisely Buffy’s heroic action that would provide him with the power he needed to rise and open the Hellmouth.

In order for God to “condemn sin in the flesh” of Jesus on the cross, he had to intensify sin. The evil needed to reach its full power and offense. This, it turns out is what the whole era of the Law was for. And herein lies the great irony and joke and scandal that God has made.

Like Buffy, Israel had a mission, to bring light to the world and combat the darkness through the Law that God gave:

You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation (from Exodus 19).

See, I have taught you statutes and rules, as the Lord my God commanded me, that you should do them in the land that you are entering to take possession of it. Keep them and do them, for that will be your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples, who, when they hear all these statutes, will say, “Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.” For what great nation is there that has a god so near to it as the Lord our God is to us, whenever we call upon him? And what great nation is there, that has statutes and rules so righteous as all this law that I set before you today? (from Deuteronomy 4)

So Israel obeys God and spreads his true worship. It is simple. Like a mission to use one’s supernatural strength to fulfill one’s calling to slay vampires.

But Israel kept failing. They would fall into idolatry and sin and have to be restored. The Mosaic system eventually got to the lowest point and God ripped the Ark of the Covenant out of the Tabernacle. But they he mercifully gave Israel a new sanctuary (Temple) and a new government (kings). Then that system had to be judged and God later gave Israel a new and better covenant with a new Temple and a new environment (empire) in which to be light to the nations.

And when Jesus comes he finds an Israel that is worse than ever. It is so bad that, unlike anything we find in Israel of the Old Testament, demons are haunting the populace, and even acting as ghouls in graveyards. The hellmouth is vomiting out legions of the undead into Israel and Jesus fights and conquers them.

So one would expect that Jesus to bring repentance and righteousness to Israel. You would think that he would cause Israel to turn from their path and return to God.

One would be wrong.

Jesus’ calling was actually to intensify Israel’s sin–to set up Israel in their final act of apostasy. He brought about the Final Judgment when the sky went black and the earth shook and quaked.

Like Buffy, Jesus found this calling hard to fulfill. He sweat blood as he begged God for a plan B. While he couldn’t fall into real sin or disbelief about his mission, his disciples could and did, telling him he had to be wrong about his mission to be rejected and die.

But this rejection set up the possibility that God would finally and truly deal with sin. The occasion of Jesus’ crucifixion became also the means of sin’s judgment. From Romans 8:

For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

And all along, Israel’s disobedience to the Law, and the climactic act of rejecting Jesus, was the means God used to accomplish this end.

Romans 5:

And the free gift is not like the result of that one man’s [Adam’s] sin. For the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation, but the free gift following many trespasses brought justification.

Romans 11:

through their [Israel’s] trespass salvation has come to the Gentiles… their trespass means riches for the world… their failure means riches for the Gentiles

For if their rejection [when they rejected Jesus] means the reconciliation of the world [which the cross of Christ brought about], what will their acceptance mean but life from the dead? [i.e. Israel has now fulfilled their role and should be encourage to join the side of the vampire slayers now]

For just as you were at one time disobedient to God [as pagans] but now have received mercy because of their disobedience [historically to the Law and climactically in the rejection of Jesus], so they too have now been disobedient in order that by the mercy shown to you they also may now receive mercy [hear and see the Gentile conversions and be convicted and repent]. For God has consigned all to disobedience, that he may have mercy on all.

In point of fact, Paul’s message that it was Israel’s sin, rather than Israel’s obedience, that led (with the obedience of Christ) to the salvation of the world, produced mocking unbelief. Thus Romans 3:

Then what advantage has the Jew? Or what is the value of circumcision? Much in every way. To begin with, the Jews were entrusted with the oracles of God [i.e. to bring them to the nations]. What if some were unfaithful? Does their faithlessness nullify the faithfulness of God [will God allow Israel’s unfaithfulness to foil his promises to bring salvation to the nations]? By no means! Let God be true though every one were a liar, as it is written,

“That you may be justified in your words,
and prevail when you are judged.”

But if our [i.e. Israel’s] unrighteousness serves to show the righteousness of God [which is proved by his provision of propitiation, 3.25], what shall we say? That God is unrighteous to inflict wrath on us? (I speak in a human way.) By no means! For then how could God judge the world? But if through my lie God’s truth abounds to his glory, why am I still being condemned as a sinner? And why not do evil that good may come?—as some people slanderously charge us with saying. Their condemnation is just.

Paul’s message was that God had arranged evil that good would come. He had consigned all to disobedience in order to have mercy on all. He had only defeated the beast by making it more beastly so that it could be finally destroyed.

A question for investors/savers/traders out there: How do poor people save money now?

Catching Every Rally Is Easy

Catching every rally is actually easy. All you have to do is buy a basket of index funds and hold them. Of course doing so will occasionally result in losses of 40% or greater as happened in 2008.

Had you bought the S&P 500 10 years ago and held on for dear life, you would have caught every rally and over those 10 years you would be about even. Had you done that in the Nasdaq, you would be down 40% still.

Of course, had you put everything on gold, silver, and energy and walked away you would have been a huge winner. However, that is not the way general funds invest or should invest. Secondly, that may have been a quite reasonable thing to do a few years back, it is much tougher to make the same case now.

Diversification No Savior

Diversification did not help in 2008. Given similar market correlations, it is highly unlikely that diversification in a basket of US and foreign stocks will do much better on the next move lower.

via Mish’s Global Economic Trend Analysis: An Awful Time to Invest; Reflections on “Lost Opportunities”.

As it happens I recently dipped into a book arguing for index funds over mutual funds. It was conveniently published in 2006 I think. It makes the above quotation jump out at me because it is what has been tormenting me lately.

I’ve been listening to a lot of Dave Ramsey lately (his radio show is from 2-4am so I get him coming back on a couple of my night shifts). Ramsey’s case for getting out of debt due to the huge negatives that are involved in that way of life is totally convincing. Ramsey’s case for investing and saving and building a fortune beyond cash accumulation sounds as unconvincing and stupid as his other argument is convincing. I’m glad he got the mutual funds on the bubble. I’m glad he got into real estate when it was going up and did so without leverage. But that artificial economy is over.

So what is left?

The Fed has destroyed interest rates. One might as well keep cash in a pillow case as use a savings account. Playing the stock exchange mirage is the only possible way to even hope to beat inflation, let alone compound your money. And that game is now over.

So what do you do?  I have no idea. As far as I can tell, frugality and thrift, while still better than the opposite, are nowhere near as rewarding. The possibility of real wealth building seems to be over.

Remembering the GOP tax policy heritage

From a newspaper editorial circa 1910:

As is well known, the Republicans think that the happiness and prosperity of the Nation are due to high tariff taxes, and the expenditure of an enormous surplus thus produced. The election gave signs that others than Republicans, and even many Republicans, have had enough of that kind of happiness, but the information has not yet extended to all those still exercising authority. The President’s message appreciated the situation, and he sounded a note of warning against extravagance. When commenting upon this counsel of perfection we remarked that it would do well to await the action of Congress before taking it for granted that the President’s counsel would be heeded. The clerks off the appropriation committees have completed their tabulations, and the figures indicate such an excess over last year’s expenditures that there is talk of raising more money by new taxes.

via Division of Labour: I swear I don’t make this stuff up c. 1910.

Stanley Hauerwas reviews Peter Leithart’s “Defending Constantine: The Twilight of an Empire and the Dawn of Christendom”

Asking me to write a review of Peter Leithart’s defense of Emperor Constantine may seem like asking the fox to inspect the henhouse. My work, after all, has been closely identified with that of John Howard Yoder and in particular with Yoder’s critique of Constantinianism. Leithart, moreover, makes clear that though Defending Constantine is a biography of Constantine, his primary purpose is theological- he has written his book in defense of Constantine and to provide a critique of the work of Yoder. Not exactly a project designed to warm this theologian’s heart.

But I think Leithart has written an important book that does more than help us to better understand the complex human being who bore the name Constantine. More significantly, Leithart’s criticisms of Yoder’s account of Constantinianism is one that Yoder would have appreciated and taken seriously. For unlike many who criticize Yoder, Leithart has actually read him appreciatively. He understands that even if Yoder does not get the “historical Constantine” right, that does not mean Yoder’s case against Constantinianism is mistaken. The history matters, Leithart makes clear, but how it matters is finally a theological question.

Read the rest: Defending Constantine: The Twilight of an Empire and the Dawn of Christendom – The Christian Century.

Assange the rock star does not bode well

The fate of whistle-blowers and tellers of dangerous truth is rarely rock-star celebrity. Count them. Mordechai Vanunu, who exposed Israel’s nuclear program – imprisoned for nearly 20 years. Gary Webb, who exposed the CIA connection to the distribution of crack cocaine in the US – probably murdered. Russian journalist, Anna Politkovskaya, who criticized Putin’s policies in Chechnya – assassinated. Lebanese journalists Samir Qassir and Gebran Tueni, who criticized the Syrian government – killed in car bombings. In 90% of such cases, says the Committee to Protect Journalists, the killers are never brought to justice. Yet, Assange, “the most dangerous man in Cyberspace,” according to the faux-alternative magazine Rolling Stone, lives to tell the tale of his persecution from the cover of Time magazine and the podium of TED conferences, weighted down with awards and honors from such establishment worthies as Economist, New Statesman, and Amnesty International.

And now he is the center of an international man-hunt. Here too, the claims are bizarre. If Wikileaks hasn’t put lives at risk or seriously damaged “national security,” by even the government’s own account, what to make of all these feverish cries for prosecution under the espionage act, for imprisonment and torture, even for execution? Are they for real, or does any one else detect an element of theater? The Wikileaks disclosures have been called cyber-terrorism by many. When before have we seen an international man-hunt for a rag-tag band of terrorists headed up by a charismatic mystery man with a striking appearance and a personal life shrouded in mystery? Now we have Osama-bin-Assange and Al-Wikileaks at war with Joe Lieberman and Sarah Palin, on one hand, and cheered on by David Frum, on the other. Notice that Frum points out that the disclosures actually support George Bush’s rationale for invading Iraq.

This is box-office gold. As some wide-awake journalist has noted, the big winner in all this is the establishment media. Before, it had one foot in the grave. Deservedly. Now it is a “truth-teller.” Readership is up, resurrected by proxy. And the major alternative press, the foundation activists, are bolstering the conclusions of the New York Times. How convenient.

I dearly wish Julian Assange were exactly as he seems – a brilliant iconoclast delivering the death blow to imperialism. But my memory is not so dim. I remember another media circus besides the one around Osama. I recall the mass adulation of a man who exuded brilliance, youth, hope, and salvation. That was in 2008, and he was a young law professor from Chicago. How did that turn out?

via The Case Against Wikileaks – I : Veterans Today.

I know we’re supposed to pay but that doesn’t change the definition of theft

Our country has a bad habit of locking up non-violent, first-time criminal offenders. Some people are dangerous and should be put in prison for a long, long time. Then there are people who effectively steal from the government for not paying their taxes. The later should be fined, forced to pay the back taxes, sentenced to community service, or something of the sort.

via The REAL reason Wesley Snipes shouldn’t go to prison.

For the record, I think the Bible commands us repeatedly, when dealing with tyrants, not to resort to individual tax resistance. So, as a model for Christian behavior, Snipes is simply wrong.

But there is nothing in the Bible that requires me to be blind to the fact that a powerful armed corporation is threatening and taking other people’s money. Referring to the those who refuse to submit to this process as “people who effectively steal from the government” makes my eyes water.

And while I very much agree with the post’s perspective on prisons, I don’t think what is happening to Snipes is part of a generic social blindness. Even if we were more sane in other areas, I think the Federal Government is always going to demand prison for tax resistors–even though it could easily confiscate the money plus a heavy penalty that would deter others.

People who don’t pay must be singled out and tormented. The majesty of the state demands no less.

Again, I’m not approving of Snipes’ behavior. I think he has brought this on himself and is being something of a fool. He could have paid his taxes and used his money and reputation to far better use in resisting the state. This was a lost opportunity.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer S1 E12 “Prophecy Girl” and Paul’s Gospel in Romans (Part One)

Pretty early on in Prophecy Girl, almost at the beginning we have a long drawn out (slow motion) of a pretty simple action sequence. Buffy gets hurled to the ground from off camera, landing in obvious pain from the impact with the ground. She sits up sluggishly.

A man’s leg appears in the camera’s view. Her adversary is standing while she is, as far as you could tell from her prone position, at his mercy.

Naturally, this man is a vampire and the blood-sucking fiend smiles in anticipation:

He obviously thinks he is about to have supper. But he is wrong. This is Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the chosen one. She alone is called and mystically equipped to fight back against the legions of darkness with her supernatural strength and reflexes. She rolls backward to her feet, stands up, pulls out her stake, watches the vampire’s grin fade, and then starts grinning herself before she slays him, turning the creature into dust.

Despite wearing a prominent cross Buffy’s m.o. is to destroy her enemies, either by shoving a sharp stick through their dead hearts (as she does to this hopeless undead victim) or cutting off their heads, or shoving them into sunlight (if she has the convenience of confronting one indoors during daylight) or burning them to ashes with fire (and one time tricking one into drinking holy water). Her strength and endurance and reflexes make her the mightier in most any fight with a vampire. She’s the power that monster’s fear.

Almost.

Not all vampires are equal. Sunnydale, California, where Buffy lives, is over a “hellmouth”–a portal into the dark dimensions.  An ancient and powerful vampire called “The Master” once tried to fully open the hellmouth and unleash all the demons on the world. He was stopped and ended up trapped down underground in a church that was buried during an earthquake. He now wants to find the power to escape to the surface and, in so doing, fulfill his quest to open the hellmouth.

The Master is much stronger than any other demon or monster Buffy has yet confronted. Even though he can’t leave his underground prison, he has many vampire minions who obey his orders and cause problems in Sunnydale above. Buffy knows she needs to find his lair and defeat the Master. She also knows this will be very difficult because he is so strong. Still, she is the Slayer and sooner or later, she is sure, she will be prepared to go down and battle him and defeat him with her superior strength and skill. That is her calling and her birthright. She is the slayer, the chosen one.

But, in the meantime, her “Watcher,” Giles, has discovered a prophecy that changes everything. Buffy is to confront the master on the night that he is to rise and he will kill her. The prophecy is not vague on the point. Buffy will die. (The prophecy even includes Isaiah 11.6–albeit horribly decontextualized).

Giles tries to hide what he has learned but she overhears him discussing it. She is going to confront the master and die. It is her destiny. Buffy completely freaks out and insists, “I quit.” She refuses to be the slayer anymore, birthright be damned. She emphatically grabs the cross from around her neck, glances at it once in her hand, and tosses it onto the table. She will not follow her calling if it means going to her death against the powers of evil.

But despite all the drama, Buffy changes her mind. After several peers are murdered by vampires on school grounds, as part of the stepped up campaign on behalf of The Master, Buffy realizes she can’t try to escape the devastation others are experiencing. The prophecy didn’t say that the Master survived their encounter. Perhaps they will both be destroyed. She has to try. She returns to the school library and puts the cross back around her neck. She’s reconciled to her calling.

She finds her way to The Master’s lair/prison and attempts to kill him. He is too fast and seems to have a telekinetic power that makes her strength useless. As a typical vampire he bites her on the neck. But before he does so he tells Buffy that she is the sacrificial lamb. Without the strength he will gain from her blood he would not have the power to break free and unleash hell on earth. She has empowered him.

He bites her and lets her unconscious body fall face first into a pool of water. Then he breaks the mystical barrier and ascends in power to wreak his will on the earth.

TO BE CONTINUED