MSI Press Blog

Arthur Yavelberg, author of the multi-award-winning book,  A Theology for the Rest of Us , shares the following column from his blog: “If there is nothing for which you would commit murder, you cannot play the role of  Lady MacBeth! ”  That is how the now aging opera diva,  Maria Callas , dismissed a young, pretty, but not quite ripened, ingenue who aspired to one day take center stage on her own.  She had the voice, yes, and even something of “the look,” but she lacked the life experience to be able to channel the passions depicted by a  William Shakespeare  or  Giuseppe Verdi.   While this production at the  Arizona Theater Company  did not intend a spiritual debate, it is significant that Callas insisted "for which you would commit murder” and not “if you have not murdered.”  In religious terms, Callas was echoing the famous line of Jesus: “But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.“ (Matthew 5:2

    Today's shared blog post comes from Arthur Yavelberg, author of A Theology for the Rest of Us : " Voltaire or Shakespeare." Voltaire  was an 18th Century French playwright.  Highly influential regarding the   French Revolution ,  he was a rabid atheist and satirist. He wrote:  “One hundred years from my day, there will not be a Bible on earth except one that is looked upon by an antiquarian curiosity-seeker.”    Ironically, it is also said that, some 50 years later, the Protestant Bible Society purchased one of the chateaus where Voltaire had his works published.  Apocryphal or not, the fact remains that far many more people today are familiar with the Bible than with Voltaire or his masterwork, “ Candide .”   I have no problem with Voltaire’s atheism.  I do have a problem with his being rabid about it.  Rationalist that he has been proclaimed to be, one would think his utter disdain for any set of beliefs would be considered far too emotional, especially on so uncer