Three Books for Men

The three books that I purchased recently at the Hoboken bookstores are:

-Iron John: A Book About Men by Robert Bly (John Eldredge has basically co-opted and somewhat Christianized Bradshaw's writings).

- A Mighty Fortress: A New History of the German People by Steven Ozment (being 3/4's German, all direct relatives off the boat and on U.S. soil before the rise of Hitler, gives me a personal and familial interest in the work).

- For Whom The Bell Tolls by some dude Ernest Hemingway (never heard of him, but I will give a shot). It is the story of the Spanish Civil War and disillusionment..."the tragic death of the ideal" as noted on the back cover.

All three books have a strong masculine tilt. Most countries refer that their collective nation as the Motherland...Germany is one that refers to itself as the Fatherland. I am sure that Freud would have had a field day exploring the paternal psycho-sexual reasons for this.

I am not sure why I obtained this testosteronated troika....perhaps I am sensing that my masculine soul-tank needs a refill. I generally eschew contemporary "Christian" books because a lot of them are really poorly written, but I am careful when reading non-Christian work to run it through the lens of Scripture. I am a strange one. So, I anticipate hardly agreeing with the major theses of the three books 100%.

None of the books were planned and premeditated for purchase. Some of the best and most meaningful books I have ever bought and read were fortuitous happenstances. They were on the shelf, they caught my eye, and after perusing, retained my interest unto buying. The man is supposed to be the hunter and the woman the gatherer...not sure this stereotype holds up in the 21st century, but I know that I like the hunt for good work in the bush of the bookstore. It is exciting to walk in and see what rears its head...game as it were. I think my wife gets the same thrill from buying a cool scarf on the cheap like she did in China for $ 7 bucks recently.

Good books reveal Truth to us as repositories of knowledge. God's book, the Bible, is the most important book of all in that it is Revelation. God would not have put his Word into a book if it had not been essential. Intriguing to note that the Apostle John writes this about Jesus:

Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.



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