It sometimes feels as though bibliographic instruction and teaching library research methodologies has changed little…

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This inscription is from Svenskt Bibliskt Uppslagsverk, an apparent dictionary gifted by one of the editors, Ivan Engnell, a former professor of Old Testament at Uppsala in Sweden, to William F. Albright when they met in Uppsala in May, 1952. The book subsequently became a part of our library’s William F. Albright Collection.

This inscription written inside the book by Engnell appears to be in one of the Scandinavian languages, probably Swedish, but I have no idea what it says. Do you?

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The catch-phrase these days in library reference work is “information literacy,” a concept which is defined by the Penn State faculty senate as being comprised of four interconnected components:

1. knowledge of information sources, the organization of information, and the nature of knowing the attributes of scholarly knowledge;
2. skills in finding, evaluating, using and effectively communicating information;
3. generalization of knowledge and skills to various applied settings with a positive disposition toward the use of new and extant information sources and information technologies;and
4. social context for the use of information, equability of access to information and the dissemination of knowledge

I have no desire to merely create a handful of informational literate students. I approach my role as a theological librarian as a ministry — a ministry which hopefully enables students to concentrate on their studies and less on Dewey decimals. Read my post about the ministry of theological librarianship.

I think Hermann Witsius was correct in saying that no one learns well unless he learns in order to teach and that no one teaches well unless he has first learned well.¹ Since these students are presumably studying with the goal of eventually teaching others (it is a seminary, after all), then they (we) must learn appropriately. My goal, then, is to teach students how to navigate the world of information — tools, taxonomy, architecture — in order to enable their study of other disciplines, not just to add another discipline to study.

But how? I can offer workshops — but students do not come to workshops that they are not required to attend. So I am left with attempting to foster relationships with faculty who are sympathetic with the goal of enabling students to do more effective research and then lobby for a chance to address their students. Some faculty are really quite open to the idea. This week, for instance, I am teaching the entire week’s worth of all of a particular faculty member’s Written Communications and Comp 2 classes, the result of which is really quite effective). Others are moderately receptive and are willing to give me a one shot introduction to bibliographic research. Still others are at least willing to send their students to me if they need help.

So I’m constantly polishing the presentation. Not so that it is impressively slick (well, not just that), but to find the most effective way to present the information. Soon, d.v., I will be able to transform these sessions into workshops with a cart of designated laptops. For the time being, however, it must be a one-sided presentation.

My appeal, then, is for ideas to make the sessions better. I’ve used Powerpoint. I’ve used mindmapping programs like MindManager. But I do not yet feel like I’ve found the best way to present the material. I typically use one of the two for the instructional aspects of the presentation, and for demonstration of online tools I use Firefox.

Any ideas?

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I had some time between classes this evening, and so went to the library to spend it. I found this poem and thought, “that’s true–but only when talking about Truth and True Beauty.” On what level is Emily Dickenson correct, and where is she wrong? Is it a question of epistemology? Can we know beauty without Truth? Is one just the aesthetic outcome of the other? I’m not comfortable with philosophy, so someone help me out here.

I died for Beauty–but was scarce
Adjusted in the Tomb
When One who died for Truth, was lain
In an adjoining Room–

He questioned softly “Why I failed”?
“For Beauty”, I replied–
“And I–for Truth–Themself are One–
We Brethren, are”, He said–

and so, as Kinsmen, met a Night–
We talked between the Rooms–
Until the Moss had reached our lips–
And covered up–our names–

The Norton Anthology of Poetry, Shorter Edition. Arthur M. Eastman, ed. New York: W. W. Norton & Co., Inc., 1970.

Beautiful. But is it True?

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Unlike most librarians, I actually don’t mind when patrons write in books — as long as they do it correctly. Marginalia is the technical term, and this does NOT include underlining and gaudy pink highlighting. I find marginalia fascinating because it provides a reading companion who dialogues with me while I read. They tell me what they thought was important, though I often disagree. They speak of cross-references and similar or contradicting arguments by others. Marginalia often enhances the experience of reading in ways that would leave us poorer without them.

Ownership marks in books are also fascinating to me. They aid in establishing the work’s provenance, or chain of ownership. I am currently repairing the binding on a book now owned by a seminary student but which was formerly owned by New Testament scholar Bruce Metzger (I must here offer a public apology to said student – I’ve had the book for about a year, but it should be done soon. Really.)

Today I came across this book, the provenance of which is unusually easy to piece together. It was donated to our library by Mrs. A. T. Robertson, wife of Dr. A. T. Robertson, another New Testament scholar. The donation bookplate:

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Prior Dr. Robertson’s ownership, the book apparently belonged to his father-in-law, Dr. John A. Broadus, the well-known preacher and president of the seminary. Dr. Broadus’ signature on the fly leaf indicates his ownership:

Prior to that, the book was owned by a slew of people:

• J. H. Vincent (?), New Haven, CT
• John Potts, Montreal, Que.
• Franklin Fairbanks, St. Johnsbury, VT
• W. G. E. ??nny?ham, Nashville, TN
• B. M. Palmer, New Orleans, LA
• B. F. Jacobs, Chicago, IL
• James A. Worden, Princeton, NJ
• D. H. ????ica, Montreal, Que.
• H. Louis baugher, Gettysburg, PA
• Warren Randolph, Newport, RI

Their signatures are nicely ordered adjacent to the title page (click for a larger image):

Books have stories — no pun intended — and they influence the lives of multiple generations in multiple places, and the stories of how they move from one to another are largely lost. It’s alot like that coin in Clive Cussler’s Sahara…

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Who said this, and of what is he speaking? Hint: it’s not Minneapolis.

The word fell upon my ear with peculiar and indescribable charm, like the gentle murmur of a low fountain stealing forth in the midst of roses, or the soft, sweet accents of an angel’s whisper in the bright, joyous dream of sleeping innocence… ‘Twas the name for which my soul had panted for years, as the hart [sic] panteth for the water-brooks. But where was _____?…

Nevertheless, I was confident it existed somewhere, and this its discovery would constitute the crowning glory of the present century, if not of all modern times. I knew it was bound to exist the very nature of things; that the symmetry and perfection of our planetary system would be incomplete without it; that the elements of material nature would long since have resolved themselves back into original chaos if there had been such a hiatus in creation as would have resulted from the leaving out _____. In fact, sir, I was overwhelmed with the conviction that _____ not only existed somewhere, but that wherever it was, it was a great and glorious place. I was convinced that the greatest calamity that ever befell the benighted nations of hte ancient world was in their having passed away without a knowledge of the actual existence of _____; that their fabled Atlantis, never seen save byt he hallowed vision of inspired poesy, was, in fact, but another name for _____…

I stumbled across this while looking for something to read to my kids at bedtime. I chose something else for them, but had to do something with this. Your guesses?

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Charlotte Brontë wrote Jane Eyre. Emily Brontë wrote Wuthering Heights. Their sister Anne Brontë wrote this:

A Word To The Calvinists

by Anne Brontë

You may rejoice to think yourselves secure,

You may be grateful for the gift divine,

That grace unsought which made your black hearts pure

And fits your earthborn souls in Heaven to shine.

But is it sweet to look around and view

Thousands excluded from that happiness,

Which they deserve at least as much as you,

Their faults not greater nor their virtues less?

And wherefore should you love your God the more

Because to you alone his smiles are given,

Because He chose to pass the many o’er

And only bring the favoured few to Heaven?

And wherefore should your hearts more grateful prove

Because for all the Saviour did not die?

Is yours the God of justice and of love

And are your bosoms warm with charity?

Say does your heart expand to all mankind

And would you ever to your neighbour do,

– The weak, the strong, the enlightened and the blind -
­
As you would have your neighbour do to you?

And, when you, looking on your fellow men

Behold them doomed to endless misery,

How can you talk of joy and rapture then?

May God withhold such cruel joy from me!

That none deserve eternal bliss I know:

Unmerited the grace in mercy given,

But none shall sink to everlasting woe

That have not well deserved the wrath of Heaven.

And, O! there lives within my heart

A hope long nursed by me,

(And should its cheering ray depart

How dark my soul would be)

That as in Adam all have died

In Christ shall all men live

And ever round his throne abide

Eternal praise to give;

That even the wicked shall at last

Be fitted for the skies

And when their dreadful doom is past

To life and light arise.

I ask not how remote the day

Nor what the sinner’s woe

Before their dross is purged away,

Enough for me to know

That when the cup of wrath is drained,

The metal purified,

They’ll cling to what they once disdained,

And live by Him that died.

Comments are now open.

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Speaking of the Reformation, here’s a new book that just came through our library. John Spurr, The Post-Reformation: Religion, Politics and Society in Britain 1603-1714 (Harlow, England: Pearson, 2006). Publisher’s blurb:

Spurr provides a substantial account of English, Scottish and Irish history from 1603 to 1714, and a unique portrait of the century’s religious life. The Civil Wars and Revolutions of the seventeenth century are brought to life with vivid quotations and a compelling narrative. Accessibly written and presented, this book is an essential starting point for undergraduates studying seventeenth-century Britain and church history.

On a different note, you’ve read Mortimer Adler’s How to Read a Book, now read Terry Eagleton’s How to Read a Poem (Malden, MA / Oxford: Blackwell, 2007). The publisher’s blurb:

Lucid, entertaining and full of insight, How To Read A Poem is designed to banish the intimidation that too often attends the subject of poetry, and in doing so to bring it into the personal possession of the students and the general reader.

• Offers a detailed examination of poetic form and its relation to content.
• Takes a wide range of poems from the Renaissance to the present day and submits them to brilliantly illuminating closes analysis.
• Discusses the work of major poets, including John Milton, Alexander Pope, John Keats, Christina Rossetti, Emily Dickinson, W.B. Yeats, Robert Frost, W.H.Auden, Seamus Heaney, Derek Mahon, and many more.
• Includes a helpful glossary of poetic terms.

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On the heels of my previous post, I thought it appropriate to now introduce you to another Reformation era man whom I respect greatly. Peter Martyr Vermigli (PMV) was an Italian priest whose theology of justification was influenced greatly by the Spaniard Juan de Valdes (coffee, anyone?). While the ecclesiastical allegiances of Contarini and Pole ultimately trumped their soteriologies, PMV chose to adhere to his Reformed theology and fled Italy. He spent time in Geneva, became a Regius Professor of Divinity at Oxford University in England, and fled back to the Continent when Queen Mary ran him out of town. He was a man of great influence, though one of humility and character. He was a good man worthy of emulation. I am edified when I consider him and read his writings. Luther, for example, I can’t read because of too frequently vitriolic tone.

The title of my blog is common enough (pun), but I chose it in reference to PMV’s Commonplaces in particular. My first post included the title page from that work. So I am joyed when others join me in my appreciation for Peter Martyr.

I frequently read a very thoughtful blog by Cynthia Nielson, a very intelligent graduate student and adjunct philosophy instructor at, well, I don’t know, but I heartily recommend her analysis of PMV and Turretin (PMV was in Geneva and knew the Turretin clan) on free will none-the-less. As of Feb 9, 2007, it is in seven parts and still growing. Read the first part here.

By the way, is it just me or is there a remarkable resemblance?

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Several years ago I read Elisabeth Gleason’s Gasparo Contarini: Venice, Rome, and Reform (Berkeley, University of California Press, 1993) and gained a respect for the man which is as great if not greater than that which I have for his Protestant counterparts.

Contarini, a Roman Catholic (RCC) priest, was a member of the Italian spirituali — that group of RCC priests who held to a largely protestant view of justification. Prior to Trent, they were free to do so. The Church had no previous declarations regarding justification. He sought reform in the RCC ranks in terms of morality, polity, and even theology.

But when he ultimately had to choose between his ecclesiology and his soteriology, he chose the former. And therein lies the tragedy of Gasparo Contarini (and Reginald Pole, for that matter). Those who held to a doctrine of justification sola fide were accused of developing a fictitious concept of justification, of “suggesting that the believer lives in a sort of Walter Mitty world in which he is treated as righteous when he actually nothing of the sort” (thank Alister McGrath, Justification by Faith, for this analogy) by the more traditional Catholics who lumped justification and sanctification together into one definition. Interestingly, Gian Pietro Carafa (who would later become pope), Cardinal Reginald Pole (who would later convene Trent and serve as Archibishop of Canterbury under Bloody Mary), and Contarini were all members of this spirituali movement at one time. When push came to shove, they abandoned these views — publicly, if not privately — and chose the RCC over their view of justification. Other spirituali such as Pietro Martire Vermigli and Bernardino Occhino chose to retain their sola fide views of justification and flee.

Anyway, Contarini had a gracious way about him. He was a man whose demeanor and scholarship I respect. He was honest about his personal faults as well as the faults of the RCC. He was a member of the Pope’s very own Consilium de Emendanda Ecclesia, a group appointed to investigate ways the RCC could institute moral and political reforms in 1537. You can read my summary of their findings here. There is much to admire about the man, even much to emulate in scholarship in service of God. Yet in the end his allegiance to RCC was greater than his allegiance to justification sola fide.

Then a few days ago this book crossed my desk: Constance M. Furey, Erasmus, Contarini, and the Religious Republic of Letters (Cambridge: CUP, 2006). I haven’t finished it yet, but here is part of the publisher’s blurb:

…analyzing a unique realm of spiritualized scholarship that cannot fit easily into any conventional intellectual chronology. By analyzing the lives, work, and correspondence of Erasmus, Thomas More, Margaret More Roper, Reginald Pole, Gasparo Contarini, and Vittoria Colonna, this book demonstrates how these Catholic men and women of letters created a distinctive kind of religious community rooted in friendship and spiritualized scholarship. By spanning the too frequently respected gap between humanist reformers in northern and southern Europe, the book uncovers a widespread, if previously less visible, network that exhibited concerns we still grapple with today.

ahhh, community, friendship, spiritualized scholarship. Sort of a 16th Century T4G. I’m now accepting recommendations for the name of their website.

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