It’s Thursday—that day that is, for some reason, not a Friday, but which will sometimes let you bumble along believing it to be a Friday until about 3:00 in the afternoon. I am, of course, not speaking from experience. Anyway, here’s what we have for you to read:
At Postmodern Conservative , Pete Spiliakos talks about what’s wrong with Republicans .
Maureen Mullarkey points us toward what’s right with today’s art .
Peter Leithart , still steadily chewing through this book , talks about what’s wrong with Martin Buber and Plato . Meanwhile, author Kevin Hector drops by to tell us what’s wrong with essentialist-correspondentist metaphysics .
And, finally, Russell E. Saltzman talks about Dives, Lazarus and ourselves ; while Michael W. Hannon is reading Foucault .
As an aside: I got pretty confused while reading Saltzman’s piece, because I distinctly remembered Dives attacking Lazarus with dogs and such, something present nowhere in the Saltzman’s version of the tale.
It turned out I was thinking of the English folk song, “Dives and Lazarus,” which embellishes somewhat on the original story. You can hear it here , as arranged by Gustav Holst; or you can listen to Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Five Variants of Dives and Lazarus here . (The tune is also familiar as “I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say” and “The Star of the County Down.” )
Anyway, initially I gathered up this music as a “weekend listening” kind of thing, but then it turned out it was Thursday. So it’s your Thursday listening. Is that better or worse?
You have a decision to make: double or nothing.
For this week only, a generous supporter has offered to fully match all new and increased donations to First Things up to $60,000.
In other words, your gift of $50 unlocks $100 for First Things, your gift of $100 unlocks $200, and so on, up to a total of $120,000. But if you don’t give, nothing.
So what will it be, dear reader: double, or nothing?
Make your year-end gift go twice as far for First Things by giving now.
