stephen wolfram
Dr Wolfram has a reputation for making sweeping claims. Once described by Wired as “the Bob Dylan of physics”, he is a reclusive and controversial figure who has always defiantly done his own thing. Born in London in 1959, he studied at Eton and Oxford, dazzling and infuriating his teachers in equal measure and leaving the university without graduating. He published his first scientific paper at the age of 15, completed a PhD in particle physics at the California Institute of Technology, and had joined the faculty and been awarded a MacArthur “genius” award, worth $128,000, by the age of 21.
via The Economist.
bits of barth
Barth CD I/2 10:24 am
testify: http://goo.gl/UFPs0
"called by the Church into the Church, we ourselves become the Church into which we are called" http://goo.gl/fgK1z
"the content of the Bible & the object of its witness is Jesus Christ as the name of the God who deals graciously with man the sinner"
"the Bible becomes clear when it is clear that it says this one thing: that it proclaims the name Jesus Christ"
"there has never yet been an expositor who has allowed only Scripture alone to speak... no one does that, for no one can"
"if we are not to dispute the incarnation... we cannot contest the use of philosophy in scriptural exegesis" http://goo.gl/BR2kL
membership
Barth, CD I/2, p. 711:
To be a member of the Church in relation to Scripture which founds, maintains and rules the Church, means not only to hear, receive and believe the Word of God, and so in one's own life to become a man directed and consecrated by the Word; more than all this it means to take seriously and understand as one's own responsibility the effective operation of the Word, its being continuously expressed and heart, its being continuously proclaimed and made fruitful.The Word of God wills always to be newly and more widely heard in the Church, and beyond the Church lies the world, where by the Church it also wills to be always heard. Because of his freedom which is grounded in this Word, a member of the Church cannot retain a passive, indifferent and merely waiting role in face of this will of the divine Word, as though anyway, in its own time what has to happen will happen. Certainly, it will happen, but not without us. We have seen that we ourselves stand at the present end and goal of the way which the Word of God takes in approaching men. We ourselves are thus present when the way leads on into the Church and the world.
Called by the Church into the Church, we ourselves become the Church into which we are called. Yet we cannot merely note that the Church is calling and wait to see whether and how far the Church will continue to call. Rather we ourselves have become the Church in person, and as such have been made responsible for its future. And this means in concrete terms that we are responsible participants in the great event by which Holy Scripture lives and rules in the Church and in the world.
bits of barth
Barth CD I/2 7:47 pm
"the leaven is really hidden. the grain of wheat must really die"
"all other forms of Church government are, therefore, false" http://goo.gl/CFzvJ
"because it is the decisive activity prayer must take precedence even of exegesis, and in no circumstances must it be suspended"
