Category: Blaise Pascal

Sunday Quote: Pascal on the Great Remedy

Blaise Pascal wrote these words (Pensees, frag. 333) concerning the incarnation:

<<L’Incarnation monte à l’homme la grandeur de sa misère par la grandeur du remède qu’il a fallu.>>

“The Incarnation shows man the greatness of his misery by the greatness of the remedy it took.”

That “God was in Christ” reconciling the world unto himself” (2 Cor. 5.19) is a great mystery. It shows us exactly how far God had to go to bring us salvation. Let us remember that this Advent season.


Sunday Quote: Blaise Pascal on the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob

This is a wonderful set of lines from Blaise Pascal’s Pensees:

Dieu d’Abraham, Dieu d’Isaac, Dieu de Jacob,
God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob,

non des philosophes et des savants
not philosophers and scientist

Certainty, certainty, sentiment, joie, paixCertainly, certainly, feeling, joy, peace

Dieu de Jesus-Christ
God of Jesus Christ

Ton Dieu sera mon Dieu
Your God is my God

Oublie du monde et de tout, hormis Dieu
Forget the world and everything, except God

Il ne se trouve que par les voies enseignees dan l’Evangile
It is found only in the ways taught in the Gospel

Grandeur de l’ame humaine.
Greatness of the human soul.

Fragment 711, Blaise Pascal, Pensees, edition de Michel Le Guern, p. 454.

Purchased: The Historical Jesus: Five Views

The Historical Jesus: Five Views

I went to Powell’s Books here in Portland yesterday to sell some books I no longer found useful (e.g. a Strong’s Concordance!). One of the greatest things about Powell’s is you actually receive a nice return on your sales and even more if you use it for store credit rather than cash (from $18+  to $22 +). I was able to purchase a book that I have had my eye on ever since it began receiving comments on other blogs: The Historical Jesus: Five Views edited by James K. Beilby and Paul R. Eddy.

I have been slowly reading through Richard Bauckham’s Jesus and the Eyewitnesses this summer as well so this should help me some with one of my largest blindspots, a.k.a. the gospels and historical Jesus studies! It appears Bauckham’s view will be closest to the contribution of Darrell L. Bock so it will be important for me to give attention to the views of  Robert M. Price, Luke Timothy Johnson, and James D.G. Dunn. I have had some interaction with the writings of Dominic Crossan so I am a tad more informed there.

In addition I grabbed a copy of Pascal’s Pensees in French to help with my reading (or to utterly discourage me). It is the edition of Michel Le Guern which tries to keep it in the format of the notes from which the book derived which allows for me to read it in little chunks. I thought if I were going to learn theological French reading Pascal wasn’t too bad an idea.