Daily Gleanings (29 May 2019)

Freedom introduces Pause, a new Chrome extension that enforces a short pause before allowing you to open distracting websites. According to the extension’s description,

When loading a distracting website, Pause creates a gentle interruption by displaying a calming green screen.  After pausing for 5 seconds, you can then choose to continue to the site – or get back to work.  Leveraging behavioral science, the interruption created by Pause gently nudges you to make informed, intentional decisions about how you are spending your time.

Pause comes pre-seeded with a list of 50 top distracting websites, and you can add or remove sites from your Pause list.

Pause is apparently built to work in Chrome even if you don’t otherwise have an active Freedom subscription. For more information, see the Chrome web store.


Michael Kruger raises the question of the rootedness of the New Perspective on Paul (NPP) in modern cultural realities, akin to what is often suggested by NPP proponents against readings of Paul in the tradition of the Reformers. The main body of the post helpfully leverages Barry Matlock’s “oft-overlooked academic article” entitled “Almost Cultural Studies? Reflections on the ‘New Perspective’ on Paul.” (See the original post for fuller bibliographic information on this essay.)

On both sides of this debate, I’m reminded of Gadamer’s observations that we, of course, always encounter the past under the influence of and as we are formed by “what is nearest to us.” But at the same time, this influence is not solely restrictive but enables our engagement with and productive knowledge of the past in particular ways.

On these themes, see “Hermeneutics and ‘the Near’” and “Tradition and Method.”

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