Update

Updated my webcomics links. Yes, I added yet another category. In case your wondering I have it set up so that I can open an entire "folder" or category at one time. Meaning that I open up all my Webcoms to Geek Out To all at once, check to see if any are new, and move on. So it doesn't take 15 minutes, but really about 5 minutes. I promise I don't waste tons of time reading webcomics when I should be studying... I promise. Does anyone actually believe me anymore???

And it doesn't end...

Weekly Hermeneutics Paper.... check.
Calvin's View of Prayer Paper.... check.
Lewis' View on Hell Paper.... check.
Xavier's Motivations for Going to Japan Paper.... check

Still to do this week:

One page paper on a word study for exegesis (due tomorrow)
Final for Systematic Overview (Thursday)
Final for History (Friday)

So the big question is... How many nights can I go without any sleep before I pass out? The answer had better be... umm... ok, so I can't count right now, but I pulled one last night, and I guess I need 2 more. So 3? 3 times 24... 72. Ok, so I'm pulling for close to 72 hours no sleep this week. Doable, right?

Yes, I need lots of prayer. And coffee.

I hardly know where to begin...

I have two issues. The first deals with the bastardization of "Jacob" into "James" within certain translations of the Bible. Where in the world did this come from? Why did it happen? Who first did it? Is there some conspiracy behind King James trying to get his name into the Bible?

Or could it be an even bigger bastard than all those conceived in the darkest of night. Yes, him. Jean Calvin. Now, I don't call Calvin a bastard out of seriousness of course, but within the same line of thought as "OMG, you killed tradition." "You bastard!" Black will be the day when I can't relate South Park to some form of theology.

Anyways. So we all know what "Jacob" means. Basically it means "grasping the heel" because thats what Jacob did to Esau on the way out. Later in the narrative Jacob's leg is touched by the one he struggled with, and would forever after that have a limp. So we all know that Jacob is pretty equated with the leg, whether it be the thing that he grasps, of the non-feeling he has in his own because he fought the law, and the law won. (Well, technically the Law wasn't given until later, but thats semantics.)

So what does Calvin have to do with this? Well I'll keep you in suspense a bit longer. Because I'm evil like that. Just skip down to the next paragraph if you REALLY care. Back to buisness here though, we know that it the Greek equivalent to Jacob is still a form of Jacob. It's still recognizable. It remained like this throughout the Latin Vulgate and in Germany. (Yes that means Luther condemned the letter of Jacob, not the letter of James.) We know it made it into the King James Version for sure. But the one place that we do know that has it also, and was widely read by the authors of the KJV, was the Geneva Bible. Oh yeah, bells are toiling now my duckies.

For you see, Calvin had a pretty important role in the Geneva Bible, providing the fundamental theology behind it. That is, it was pretty much Reformed from start to finish. It's why Reformed Christians still find it useful today. But was it intentional? Was it some slick move by Calvin to totally throw the rest of history into confusion? Did he hate the pope so much that he had to change a bit of the Bible just to spite him?

Actually, probably not. For as critical as I am of Calvinists (those that follow Dort) I actually am impressed by some of Calvin's reflections. Now, that's as far as I let him go. He might have some good reflections on God, but to say that they are somehow doctrinal? Well let's see what the Orthodox have to say about it, and maybe we'll start opening up that option.

Any person knowing a lick of history will realize that Jean Calvin was originally from France. Yes I know, plenty good opportunity to pick on the French. Almost as easy as throwing a grenade in a bucket of paint to create art. Yes it might be 'effective' and it might indeed be enlightening or funny. But talk about taking the easy way out of things! Anyways, and here's the key, in French "leg" is "jambe." And no that wasn't the oven timer you just heard, that's the connection between "Jacob" and "James." English, being a bastard language of its own (a combination of several strands of German, Latin, Celt, regional dialects, and French), easily makes "jambe" into "Jame" or "James."

And if think about it, old Jean himself probably picked this up early on. Can't you just imagine him preaching upon the epistle to the guy whose name literally means 'leg' being one of the foundational 'legs' of faith that we must stand upon (against Luther who saw the letter as actually cutting the legs out from under the faith). Or that in supplanting his brother's birthright, he got the leg up on him. So he probably made a really interesting rhetorical point. Of course who knows if this was unique to Calvin, but was already made within English which already associated "James" with a "leg." Although all the sources that I've read (read: random websites thanks to Google search) only assume that James comes from Jacob, I think the French connection makes it pretty clear where it indeed came from. Am I hasty in blaming Calvin? I'm sure he didn't help the matter, and probably said "James" a lot more than "Jacob" when doing Sunday sermons.

Okay, the second issue I want to vent about can be found here. Basically they want to start a school in Toronto that would be for blacks, by blacks. Now I know that my views towards SOME aspects of Canadian culture are openly hostile. I don't approve of social healthcare, and how any cultural encourages open drug use, sex, and hatred towards its American neighbors is beyond me. Now of course in America we have these problems as well, but at least a majority of us have some sense to stand up and say "Umm, no, it is not okay for you to just do whatever you want." But for the most part, I'll let the Canadians do whatever they want to. I'm not staying here for any long term period in my life. So basically, while I might not agree with them, they can do whatever.

However! I do have some experience with racism. Southern Kentucky boy right here!! Fan of the South, even though I have to live with the reality that there is still a lot of bigotry and hatred based upon race there. Shoot, we lost a war over it (which was a pretty good thing of course). Racism is bad, and while we Southerners aren't perfect (by any stretch of the imagination), the worse is gladly behind us. After the war, we spent 100 years, a century, under Jim Crow. He was our friend, and by golly if he didn't do us good. Those people had their place and we had ours. We were truly separate, yet equal (or to hear some accounts, separate, unfortunately equal). If we couldn't have 'em as slaves, then at least we didn't have to deal with them.

And if a majority made your stomach turn, possibly eyes open wide and want to teach me a thing or two about treating others the same as myself... good. Because that's my attitude whenever anyone presents a position of "separate, yet equal." Ironically, it is perhaps best seen in post-modern thought. Every culture/metanarrative/group is indeed separate, but equal, since none are better than another. And although I am not going to expound further on the equivalence of postmodernity and Jim Crow, I think the connection should be seen from the outset.

But what do we get in Toronto? City of one of the best nations in the world (at least better than America, eh?). City of progression, and not backwood thinking that only leads to a war-mongering president and silly people who support him. At least we don't have that heritage at all, especially that of racism. Oh wait...

And you see, here's my point. Any group that advocates for a "separate, yet equal" is only setting itself up for trouble. Only when those great people stood and condemned that horrid phrase was improvement made in the South. We do not remember Martin Luther King, Jr. because he was a great person. No, instead we remember the very cause that made him stand up and declare a radical dream for the future. Not out of any gain for himself, but because an entire culture was being subdued and repressed.

What then happens when that or any culture willingly accepts, shoot even requests, that separation? If this isn't the biggest step backward of all time, I really don't know what is. What are we, especially us that embrace a culture that includes a history of Jim Crow, to think? Jim Crow was rightly condemned by the civil rights movement. So should this. A separate, but equal issue (hehe) that also involves this is affirmative action. King criticized it, saying that forcing the issue only would make his race "lazy" and "undeserving." Basically, they wouldn't be worthy of the freedom that he fought and died for. If we look at the very culture that has come out of these movements, one really wishes that King would come back and tell them all to shut up. The Boondocks did an episode about that, and I still think it perhaps the best critical commentary about the current black culture in America. Does Canada need to see it also? Do they need to have the same experiences that America had just to realize how WRONG a 'separate, yet equal' position really is? I pray that they wouldn't. But I'm am not confident about God answering that prayer in the near future. At least I know I would be labeled a blasphemer by Calvin. (No, really, Institues, 3.xx)

What's even worse, is that there are already in place special schools for First Nations (that's Indians for you Americans) groups, AND gay and lesbian schools. WTF indeed!!! The First Nations can be likened to the black school situation (that needs to be condemned), but gays get their own school? Segregation indeed. And I think that the group that wishes for segregation is indeed a group that needs more help than any committee or separate school can give them. They definately need God more than anything.