It’s Here, It’s Here, It’s HERE!!
WOOHOOOOOO!
My copy of the new Concordia: A Reader’s Edition Of The Book Of Concord just arrived this morning, and it sure is purty! 
It’s actually hard to believe that this volume only cost $20 (the introductory price through the end of this year; after that the MSRP of $29.99 kicks in, at which price it’s still a bargain!), as it is a gorgeous, solid, & well put-together book.
Concordia Publishing House (aka CPH) (the official publishing house of the LCMS) has done the Synod, indeed all of Christendom, a great service in the publishing of this book. Kudos to the Rev. Dr. Paul McCain (acting CEO of CPH [I pray that SP Kieschnick is moved beyond petty politics to formally approve/appoint McCain as permanent CEO, but that's a whole 'nother rant...] for this, and everything else he’s done at CPH!!
We are blessed to have such a resource as CPH at our disposal — one only need look at the ELCA’s publishing house (Augsburg-Fortress) to be reminded of how fortunate we are. While CPH is putting out new offerings like Concordia, A-F is countering with tripe like the Here We Stand Confirmation curriculum, wherein the Small Catechism is relegated to a mere 30 pages at the back (!?!) of the confirmand textbook! [Hat tip to Bunnie Diehl]
I encourage you to go and purchase many copies of Concordia. Even better, work with your pastor to coordinate a bulk purchase of them at church, perhaps even with an eye towards making a copy of Concordia a standard gift to your newly confirmed youth!
-ghp
Book Tag Bingo
Well, thanks to that pesky Aardvark, I’ve now become part of the in-crowd & get to play Book Tag. What’s that, you ask (and, seriously, if you’re asking, you need to read more than just this blog, although I’m darned glad you read my little soapbox rantings!)?
I’m in the 6th generation in this round: The Aardvark was tagged by Bob Waters, who was tagged by the lovely orthobabe Bunnie Diehl, who had been tagged by Jordan Ballor, who had been tagged by Kathryn Judson, who started the whole shebang.
Kathryn’s rules were simple:
Imagine that a local philanthropist is hosting an event for local high school students and has asked you to pick out five to ten books to hand out as door prizes. At least one book should be funny and at least one book should provide some history of Western Civilization and at least one book should have some regional connection. The philanthropist doesn’t like foul language (but will allow some four-letter words in context, such as expressed during battle by soldiers). Otherwise things are pretty wide open. What do you pick?
Bunnie then added:
1) one book must be something you’re a bit embarrassed to admit is on your favorites list, 2) all books would be suitable for adults and 3) one book changed the way you look at the world.
I will add this one restriction on my listing — I’m limiting myself to books that I’ve got sitting on my bookshelves here at Schloß Territorial Bloggings. A minor limitation, but helpful nonetheless. And with that said, let’s get on with it…
1) “Worldview Changer” — The Hammer of God by Bo Giertz. I’ve expounded previously on the extent of my LCMS “lifer” status, but there were some things that I just didn’t “get” until after I read this book. I can’t really do this book justice in only a paragraph — it’s that good.
2) “Funny Book” — No one single, monograph type of book here. Rather, I’d offer up the collected works of folks like Charles Schulz (Peanuts), Bill Watterson (Calvin & Hobbes), & Berke Breathed (Bloom County - esp. from ~1982 thru 1987). For more off-the-beaten-track humor of the comic-strip type, Sam Hurt’s Eyebeam strip (no longer in production) was quite good, albeit not as consistent & value-laden as Peanuts, consistently magical & insightful as Calvin & Hobbes, or as meteoric as Bloom County.
3) “Solid Values” — Staying in the comics/graphical vein, Jack Berrill’s Gil Thorp was as good & solid as they came during Berrill’s time as the writer/artist, from 1958 until his death in 1996. The strip is still going, but it’s nowhere near as good as when Berrill was at the helm.
4) “Technology” –
- Father, Son & Co., by Thomas J. Watson, Jr. — This biographical history of IBM is quite good at laying out the earliest days of “Western” technology.
- Accidental Empires, by Robert X. Cringely — Cringely, the former gossip columnist at InfoWorld (who successfully sued to keep use of the name, even as InfoWorld has kept the name & column in production) does a fabulous job of fleshing out the happenings of Silicon Valley during it’s rise to prominence. This book was good enough that it was spun off into not one, but two PBS specials (Triumph of The Nerds & Nerds 2.0)
- Apple Confidential, by Owen Linzmayer — You can’t go wrong with a nice, juicy history of Apple Computer.
5) “Western Civ” –
- The Two Germanies since 1945, by Henry Ashby Turner, Jr., & The Berlin Wall, by Norman Gelb — So much of the History of the 20th Century is tied up in Germany. These two books (Ashby’s is more “academic” in tone, while Gelb’s is a very enjoyable read) sum up a large chunk of that history. I regret that there isn’t a book about WWI and/or Weimar Germany that I can offer up, but that is almost to be expected, I guess.
- D-Day & Band of Brothers, both by Steven Ambrose — WWII is the source of a great many books, and Ambrose does a great job.
- Gibbon’s The Decline & Fall Of The Roman Empire — A/The standard bearer for a reason, and well worth the effort to get through it.
6) “Regional” –
- Devil’s Night (and other true tales of Detroit), by Ze’ev Chafets — This book doesn’t get it all exactly right, but for me (one of the last babies born at Saratoga General Hospital in Detroit the November after the 1967 riots, and someone who is proud to have grown up around the Motor City) this book really did help flesh out some of the details about just how & why a city that was so great during the time when my dad grew up there in the ’40’s & ’50’s, went to hell in the late ’60’s & ’70’s, and why those forces are still the ones that keep it down to this day.
- Anatomy of An Explosion, by Kurt Marquart & A Tale of Two Synods, by Mark Braun — These two books give an excellent rundown of what happened to the LCMS over the course of the 20th Century.
7) “General Enjoyment/Series” — I really like the whole “Jack Ryan” series by Tom Clancy, with the earlier books still being the best - e.g., The Hunt for Red October & Patriot Games, although Without Remorse is also very good. So I guess I’d donate them all (and Red Storm Rising, too, even though it’s not in the “Ryanverse”).
“Guilty Pleasures” –
- The Rabbit… trilogy by John Updike. These are richly evocative books, although I fear that they might not pass the “foul language” test. Even so, I’ll donate them & let the powers that be make the call…
- Mankind - Have A Nice Day! by Mick Foley — Yeah, yeah, yeah… I like the soap opera that is pro wrestling. What of it?
- I Am Charlotte Simmons, by Tom Wolfe — It’s technically still in the house, because I haven’t returned it to the library yet. It was troublingly accurate, based on my almost 20 years of exposure to Academe (including four years working at a campus that aspired to Duke/Dupont-level stature…), and that’s perhaps why I found it so disquieting, though still enjoyable.
9) “Too Obvious To Make Further Note Of:” The Bible & The Book of Concord
Folks I am now tagging: David Brazeal, Seminarian Chaz Lehmann, and the Beggars All duo of Tim the Enchanter & Caspar Heydenreich.
Thanks for your attention, you’ve been a wonderful audience! 
-ghp
CPH’s upcoming BoC — More Info
Rev. McCain has just posted some more detailed Q&A’s about the soon-to-be-released reader’s edition of the Book of Concord.
There’s been quite a bit of discussion on/about this new edition of the BoC over at LutherQuest. I think it’s a good thing. A very good thing. I don’t see a downside. While any (every?) translation has issues due to the whole translation process, I think that the Tappert & Kolb-Wengert translations of the BoC are flawed enough that CPH is actually doing the LCMS a great service by reintroducing (and refreshing) the Dau-Bente translation. From my (admittedly limited) reading & research, the Dau-Bente translation is the most faithful English translation, and while the original German and/or Latin versions would be preferable, Dau-Bente is a very adequate substitute.
My hope is that this new edition of the BoC will find its way into the awareness & reading lists of a larger number of “average” Lutheran “pew-sitters.” It seems like it will be a prime option for adult instruction and/or Bible classes, and I think that it would be a great source of study & growth for post-Confirmation youth groups (in fact, I would like to see it be a gift for each of our confirmands, much like I want to make the Daily Prayer Catechism a gift for each of our confirmands when they begin the two year Confirmation process…).
The more folks have the opportunity to learn what it means to be Lutheran, the better off both they (individually) and we (corporately as the Church Militant) will be.
-ghp
Good stuff a-comin’ from CPH
Thanks to John H. for his great summary of all the good stuff that Concordia Publishing House (CPH) is preparing & getting ready to release in the near future.
I thank God for the blessing that Rev. McCain & his wonderful staff at CPH have been to the LCMS and Lutherans everywhere. Not only has he been fiscally/administratively astute & responsible (getting CPH into the black & even contributing $$$ back into the LCMS), but he has CPH turning out loads of good, useful, & soundly orthodox books & materials.
I’m especially excited about the not-soon-enough-to-be-released Concordia, the “Reader’s Edition of the Book of Concord”, as I would prefer a faithful updating of the Bente/Dau version of the 1580 Book of Concord (used in the Triglotta) to either the Tappert (which has some problematic translation-related issues) or Kolb/Wengert [which is a bit too "critical-text"-y -- i.e., it's a bit too, for lack of a better word, "academic" as it tries to resolve the tensions between the various versions of the BoC, and basically ends up being an "über-text" rather than the 1580 BoC which (for example) LCMS pastors pledge to uphold at their Ordinations.].
Check out John’s posting for the rest of the juicy details!
-ghp
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