First Word

His book Respectable Sins starts off with a few orientation chapters, the burden of which is to show: You are already a saint (more…)

There is a lot of discussion in conservative circles of (more…)

On a visit to Colonial Williamsburg I crossed the recently completed (more…)

We are near the third stage of a classic ploy.  The ploy is to create (more…)

To understand the troubled waters through which Slovakia had (more…)

In previous posts I have outlined a few of the reasons I am skeptical (more…)

After writing a response to a question under another post, (more…)

We can simultaneously praise Mrs Sarah Palin for (more…)

The author was a prominent Church of Scotland man (more…)

years old (more…)

Michael Butler, heir apparent to Greg Bahnsen, will be teaching (more…)

Continuing the brief history of the Slovak people from the narrative begun earlier, through the modern era, we see very clearly illustrated (more…)

This is the 65th anniversary of the Allied firebomb-murder of (more…)

This is a story about Google, not First Word. But to make make the case I will be developing here, I will need to present evidence, (more…)

The topic addressed in this little book is important, asking such questions as what is law? where did it come from? what are the dynamics (more…)

The thesis is that the “Easter belief” of the early Christians (a) refers intentionally to a literal, physical (not merely spiritual) raising of Jesus from the dead, and (b) the mode and breadth of this belief can only be explained on the hypothesis that that is what actually happened. The thesis is pursued in specific and detailed interaction with the Leben Jesu literature, most of which denies the resurrection. The characteristic emphasis that we would expect from Wright is (more…)

This book (see biblio info at end) is a nice companion to the Wentorf biography of this dear German Reformed pastor who died (more…)

This movie is based on an actual incident in Matewan, West Virginia (more…)

This essay by Gottlob Frege (1848-1925) was published in 1892 in the journal Zeitschrift für Philosophie und philosophische Kritik, pp. 25-50. Dealing with the “philosophy of language,” it discusses the distinction that should be made between the sense and reference (hence: the title of the essay) of linguistic expressions.

It will be helpful to have the essay in hand to follow our discussion with maximum profit. It is available in more than one English-translation editions. Our discussion here covers the pages corresponding to pp. 25-31 of the original.

This report is based on a “target of opportunity” — an old beat up book from a co-worker; though held together with masking tape and rubber bands, (more…)

This is an important documentary for two reasons: it is one of the first “holocaust” documentaries ever made (1955 or 1956), and several of the images (whether created by picture or word) have proven quite durable. It is also blessedly short, coming in at just over a half-hour. For these reasons, it should be seen by everyone. (more…)

While only a few people will be interested in our philosophical podcasts, I hope many will give the operatic ones a try. Here, we discuss (more…)

In the documentary called Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, the droll Ben (more…)

At its national convention Saturday April 26 in Kansas City, the (more…)

There are basically two different models of conservatism (more…)

A fictional story about one of the greats, well played as far as (more…)

Every dictionary I have consulted offers an unsatisfactory (more…)

A movie made from the [Marvin] Neil Simon stage comedy. A couple old men that worked for decades together in vaudeville are to get (more…)

Yiddish, according to some, was a language designed so that jews (more…)

It behooves us to take an opening stance on the volcano (more…)