International Journal of Lay Philosophy

Welcome to the second installment of my small series on Christian Nationalism. If you missed it, you can read the first one here .  We finished the last article with the conclusion that your constitutional rights (life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, leading to free speech, free religion, carrying weapons, private property, etc) are not God-given. There is nothing inherent to your status as a God-created individual that gives you any "right" to express yourself freely, or to carry an assault rifle, or even to enjoy personal liberty (in the human sense of the word). Instead, God created us with the duty to glorify him. Your life is not your own, for you are bought with a price, etc (1 Cor 6:19-20).  What that means is that all the rights we in America value so highly are established by government, not by God. And although that should recalibrate our perspective of them, I don't mean to devalue constitutional rights. Just understand this correctly: that's all they a...

"Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth." - Matthew 5:5 I recently finished Dostoevsky’s The Idiot. I quite enjoyed the novel, though it took me a couple of years of sporadic reading to get through it. As has been recognized for the better part of a century and a half, Dostoevsky’s novels are masterpieces. Together with Tolstoy, Dostoevsky’s writing is to Russian literature what the pyramids are to Ancient Egypt. Immense fixtures, solitary products of their time, standing alone on the horizon. In fact, the one criticism that seems to hold some merit, namely, that it is too long, is also something the man himself admits in his letters 1 . This book alone has no doubt minted hundreds of later writings from simple blog posts (such as this guilty piece) to PhD theses. This is why I was quite surprised to find, after reading some of these umbral writings, that Myshkin is quite a controversial figure. Many seem to be confused as to whether he is a hero or, at the ver...

 In another quote that's probably more wordy than you remember, John Adams famously wrote to his wife:  " The Science of Government it is my Duty to study, more than all other Sciences: the Art of Legislation and Administration and Negotiation, ought to take Place, indeed to exclude in a manner all other Arts.—I must study Politicks and War that my sons may have liberty to study Mathematicks and Philosophy. My sons ought to study Mathematicks and Philosophy, Geography, natural History, Naval Architecture, navigation, Commerce and Agriculture, in order to give their Children a right to study Painting, Poetry, Musick, Architecture, Statuary, Tapestry and Porcelaine." Adams referred, of course, to his role in the still-ongoing Revolutionary War (this letter was sent in 1780) and his upcoming role as the second U.S. President. Adams saw the oft-unpleasant exercises of statesmanship as a necessity that was both his duty and opportunity to achieve, in order that future generati...

I'd like to start a small series about the intersection of the American Constitution and a Biblical worldview. This isn't quite 'what does the Bible say about politics' (that's a book, at least). Rather, let's discuss how we, as Christians, should understand and interact with the United States of America. I should disclaim right off the bat that I'm writing to and for Christians here; the entire point of this exercise is to approach this subject from (my own) Christian worldview. If you're reading this as a non-Christian, I hope you find it interesting, but don't expect to agree with everything I say. With that being said, let's get to work. In short, this post will show that the concept of rights, as we typically understand it, is a man-made concept, not a Biblical one. If that seems bold or counterintuitive, walk with me. What do we mean by "rights"? Let's define our terms before we get into the weeds. The rights I'm talking ...

“I believe in one God, the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible….” A couple of months ago, I installed Substack. I didn’t know much about Substack before installing it and after having used it (as a reader not a writer), I still don’t know much about it. Nevertheless, downloading it and entering the stream of inchoate thoughts intensified a sentiment I had been ruminating on for some time. I think if there is any conclusion to be drawn from the proliferation of content in our age it is that most of everyone has not much to say. Everyone is a writer and not many people have anything worth writing. Everyone has opinions and not many people have opinions worth eight cents. Everyone has something to say and, at the same time, nothing to say. In other words, giving everyone a platform has made us (or, rather, me) realize that no one really deserves one.  I am, of course, nothing but a hypocrite in saying this. I am writing my opinion of other p...