The Cusp of the Second Millennium

An unexpected realization came to me the day I had to pack up my books for shipment to the distant spot where I was to spend a change-of-pace research year. I was to be away from my personal library for an entire year, a prospect that gives any bibliophile teeth-rattling separation anxieties, and I was forced to make harsh choices about which volumes to take and which to leave behind. If I shipped too many books, the cost would be atrocious.

As I began to make my second-and third-round eliminations, a pattern became apparent to me: I was picking Aeschylus, Clement of Alexandria, Epictetus, Tertullian, Nemesius, John Chrysostom, Augustine, Boethius, Dante, Hugh of St. Victor, Anselm. Many of these books I had already read, but they seemed important to take with me. Finally if hit me: I was choosing no books from the twentieth century! The most recent ones in my shipment list were Bushnell, Nietzsche, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Did that mean I was bored with the twentieth century? Hardly, for I teach several courses, and enjoy teaching them, in twentieth century theology. The truth is, however, that I found the pre-modern writers more significant for my growth, more crucial for my own being, than the scientific and literary achievements of the twentieth century.

TO

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Thomas C. Oden

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An unexpected realization came to me the day I had to pack up my books for shipment to the distant spot where I was to spend a change-of-pace research year. I was to be away from my personal library for an entire year, a prospect that gives any bibliophile teeth-rattling separation anxieties, and I was forced to make harsh choices about which volumes to take and which to leave behind. If I shipped too many books, the cost would be atrocious.

As I began to make my second-and third-round eliminations, a pattern became apparent to me: I was picking Aeschylus, Clement of Alexandria, Epictetus, Tertullian, Nemesius, John Chrysostom, Augustine, Boethius, Dante, Hugh of St. Victor, Anselm. Many of these books I had already read, but they seemed important to take with me. Finally if hit me: I was choosing no books from the twentieth century! The most recent ones in my shipment list were Bushnell, Nietzsche, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Did that mean I was bored with the twentieth century? Hardly, for I teach several courses, and enjoy teaching them, in twentieth century theology. The truth is, however, that I found the pre-modern writers more significant for my growth, more crucial for my own being, than the scientific and literary achievements of the twentieth century.