Reviews for More Secrets Of Hebrew Words

The average rating for More Secrets Of Hebrew Words based on 2 reviews is 5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2020-08-27 00:00:00 Jason Navy Although this sprightly work of synthesis begins with a chapter on Sunday in antiquity, it is largely a study of Sunday observance in England and America from the Reformation to the present. With only a nod here and there to the Sunday behavior of ordinary people on the Christian day of rest, Miller largely treats the views about Sunday'expansively defined'of such influential individuals as Samuel Johnson, William Law, Joseph Addison, Jonathan Edwards, Oliver Goldsmith, Joshua Reynolds, John Ruskin, Henry David Thoreau, Wallace Stevens, Robert Lowell, and Walt Whitman. Miller is especially drawn to people like Thoreau, who dabble in thinking about Sunday as the day of the Sun. Miller writes gracefully, defining his terms simply and usually without condescension. (Such is the current state of education that I cheerfully grant him considerable leeway along those lines in any case.) Occasionally Miller misses a source that might have provided a different perspective on one of his characters, such as Ann Twaite's Glimpses of the Wonderful: The Life of Philip Henry Gosse (2002). And Miller is overly anxious to broaden adherence to the Christian faith unless a subject explicitly and determinedly announces his anti-Christianity. Finally, it seems to me that the line between Sabbatarian and non-Sabbatarian runs roughly along the divide between evangelical and non-evangelical, a possible delineation that Miller neither acknowledges nor challenges.

Review # 2 was written on 2018-05-25 00:00:00 Andrew Goods There were some interesting points, but what really struck me was what Miller's examination of historical figures' Sundays did NOT add to his book. Rather than illuminating the variations of Sunday observance through the years, it seems to go the other way, i.e. using Sunday practices to highlight each individual's personal contradictions and failings. There were numerous occasions where I was double-checking that I was still reading about the same person because the information was completely opposite to Miller's initial analysis. The history sections petered out around the 1/3 mark, at which point the book really became a slog.