The Scriptorium Daily

Author: Fred Sanders

  • Hosea Calls it Quits

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    Fred Sanders
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    The book of Hosea is a fearsome thing. This prophet’s message is similar to any number of other prophets, but he means business in a way that makes his word to Israel uniquely unforgettable. He doesn’t just dust off Deuteronomy’s blessings and curses, check Israel’s current performance against them, and then issue the evaluation that…

  • Desert Scene

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    Fred Sanders
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    You may think of the desert as an empty or lonely place, but this desert is a HOT SPOT in more ways than one. It not only sustains life, but a thriving community of many species living in harmony. The dominant figure is our host, a saguaro cactus (cereus giganteus) spreading out his four arms…

  • Bilateral Asymmetry in a Preiconoclastic Encaustic Pantocrator

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    Fred Sanders
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    The following remarks should be considered as an extrapolation of certain lines of thought suggested by Manolis Chatzidakis’s seminal article “An Encaustic Icon of Christ at Sinai” published in The Art Bulletin (Vol. 50, No. 1, 113. Mar. 1968), 197-208. My own modest contribution to the critical discussion does not proceed using the modes of…

  • Big Orange Cat Head

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    Fred Sanders
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    Phoebe Age Four goes for uncharacteristically expansive forms in this assemblage of shapes. Perfect bilateral symmetry dominates the arrangement of the two ears, two eyes, two whatever you call those things on a cat’s muzzle. (Lips? Do cats have lips?) And exactly four whiskers on each side. But for all the symmetrical geometry, this drawing…

  • T. S. Eliot: Things That Can Just Barely Be Said

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    Fred Sanders
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    T. S. Eliot (1888-1965) is so hard to read that every class session on his poetry might just as well start with the question, “Why bother reading something so difficult?” I think you have to start by admitting that poetry this difficult actually might not be worth reading. Writing incomprehensible poetry is actually pretty easy.…

  • The Apostles Creed and Abortion

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    Fred Sanders
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    Presbyterians Pro-Life is an organization which is fighting the good fight within the Presbyterian Church USA. PPL is speaking out in defense of the unborn and addressing the whole host of sexuality issues that are rocking that denomination. It’s hard to keep up with the little renewal groups within all the mainline denominations, but it…

  • B.C. by Johnny Hart: “This Warm, Mischievous Feeling”

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    Fred Sanders
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    Johnny Hart (1931-2007) died this past weekend (Sat. Apr. 7). His comic strips will continue to be published indefinitely, which is possible because his unsigned collaborators live on. It’s hard to believe, but B.C. ran in daily papers for over fifty years (from Feb. of 1958). Hart belongs in that Charles Schulz pantheon of classic…

  • Union with Christ and Two Types of Christians

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    Fred Sanders
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    It seems to me that there are basically two types of Christians. I know that’s a silly statement to make, since there must be dozens of meaningful categories to sort Christians into: doctrinal, denominational, sociological, temperamental, left-handed, and so on. But what I have in mind is the central issue of soteriology, the doctrine of…

  • Resurrection Bunny

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    Fred Sanders
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    Let us agree to call the rabbits in this drawing: Witnesses of the resurrection. One perches atop the cross with his back to us, the other leaps forward into our space with a smile and with unavoidable eye contact. The black outlining can scarcely contain the ragged red-brown coloring that unites the bunnies and the…

  • Between Cross and Resurrection in Narnia

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    Fred Sanders
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    The day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday is called Holy Saturday, and it’s hard to know exactly how you’re supposed to feel on this day. It’s not the day Christ died or the day he was raised, but the day on which he was dead. Most churches agree to be still on this day.…

  • Viewing the Crucifixion

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    Fred Sanders
    in

    A bolt of lightning splits the stormy sky and flashes toward a monumental cross. To one side stands a Roman soldier with a sword in one hand and a long spear in the other. He smiles smugly to have completed his dirty work. It’s not a good thing to do, but he’s good at doing…

  • Three Crosses Two Ways

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    Fred Sanders
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    The fact that Christ was crucified between thieves, one on his right and one on his left, was not lost on the writers of the gospels. They recognized it as a shockingly literal fulfilment of the prophecy that God’s servant would be “numbered among transgressors” (Isaiah 53:12). The fact that one of the transgressors recognized…