
originally published 3/1/2009
Craig Gay, author of Dialogue, Catalogue & Monologue: Personal, Impersonal & Depersonalizing Ways to Use Words (Regent, 2008), reflects on the essential linguistic nature of humanity: how our growth (or decline) in life is tied to words. Language is not merely a tool for humans to use, but it is a part of our very being as creatures made in the image of the God who is the living Word. Because of this, words are essential to our life. Gay further discusses the distinction between “seeing” and “hearing” as metaphors of knowledge and understanding. Gay stresses that our culture does not encourage us to know by receiving words from a person or a personal God, but by making impersonal observations. For Gay, this mode of understanding, while extraordinarily valuable and necessary, is nevertheless partial and insufficient for life.
18 minutes
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