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Welcome to Jonathan's Corner:
Orthodox Books Online, and More
Today's Pick:
Against Protestant Fundamentalist Orthodoxy. Creation and Holy Orthodoxy: Fundamentalism is Not Enough
What this site is all about:
A showcase of creative works
This site is a showcase of creative works and writing by Jonathan Hayward that have been collected for well over a decade. The sections of the site About (includes What's New?), the Book Store, Et Cetera, and an online library featuring Orthodox Books and More.
What you can find here:
Orthodox Books and More: This collection includes Eastern Orthodox Christian theology, and literature. It is by far the largest section of this website, and possibly the most interesting.
The collection includes smaller sections of Orthodox theology, articles, assorted creations, journals, miscellaneous nonfiction, novels, Orthodox humor, satire, short stories, Socratic dialogue, and technology. If you're looking for a place to explore, why not begin with one of these links?
About: About the author Jonathan Hayward, and this site, which is his pride and joy. Includes a list of What's New?
Book Store: Many of the works here are good on a computer and even better in a book. (The eBooks are free, and you can read them online for free.) Includes works that received a five star review with the Midwest Book Review): The Christmas Tales, A Cord of Seven Strands, Doxology, Firestorm 2034, The Sign of the Grail, The Steel Orb, and Yonder.
Et Cetera: A motley collection of artwork, games, humor, open source software, a role playing game, web services, and other miscellaneous works.
Site Map: A map of Jonathan's Corner. Broken down by subject.
As over a decade has gone by, Orthodox Books and More has grown to be much more than one section of the website among others. It has several sections of its own, and it has become the crowning jewel of the site, with a great many of its author's favorite works.
What's New? A Quote:
I included Aristotle's Physics when I originally posted An Orthodox Bookshelf, then read most of the text and decided that even if the Fathers' science was largely Aristotelian physics, reading the original source is here less helpful than it might appear. The Fathers believed in elements of earth, air, fire, and water, and these elements are mentioned in the Theophany Vespers, which are one of the primary Orthodox texts on how the cosmos is understood. However, even if these are found in Aristotelian physics, the signal to noise ratio for patristic understanding of science is dismal: Aristotle's Physics could be replaced with a text one tenth its length and still furnish everything the Fathers take from it.
I would like to take a moment to pause in looking at the word "physics." It is true enough that historically Aristotelian physics was replaced by Newton, who in turn gave way to Einstein, and then quantum physics entered the scene, and now we have superstring theory. And in that caricatured summary, "physics" seems to mean what it means for superstring theory. But I want to pause on the word "physics." Orthodox know that non-Orthodox who ask, "What are your passions?" may get a bit more of an earful than they bargained for. "Passions" is not a word Orthodox use among themselves for nice hobbies and interests they get excited about; it means a sinful habit that has carved out a niche for itself to become a spiritual disease. And "physics", as I use it, is not a competitor to superstring theory; etymologically it means, "of the nature of things," I would quote C.S. Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader:
"I am a star at rest, my daughter," answered Ramandu. "When I set for the last time, decrepit and old beyond all that you can reckon, I was carried to this island. I am not so old now as I was then. Every morning a bird brings me a fire-berry from the valleys in the Sun, and each fire-berry takes away a little of my age. And when I have become as young as the child that was born yesterday, then I shall take my rising again (for we are at earth's eastern rim) and once more tread the great dance."
"In our world," said Eustace, "a star is a huge ball of flaming gas."
"Even in your world, my son, that is not what a star is but only what it is made of."
Read more of "Physics", posted Thursday 17 May 2012, Christos Jonathan Seth Hayward's birthday and the Season of Pascha.