The death of a leader: Calvin commenting on Joshua in the last year of his life (1563)

In the early modern period the testament, death, burial and funeral orations of public figures were often registered carefully. Such accounts told the story of the esteem in which the leaders were held, as the example of Martin Luther shows. While the account of John Calvin’s demise seems simpler, in his case the story of his dying days is focused on his farewell addresses. The surviving manuscripts of Calvin’s contributions to the Bible study of Joshua in 1563–1564 testify to his awareness of his mortality. How did he, their moderator, address the Company of Pastors in the course of their treatment of the book of Joshua in the weekly congrégations during the last year of his life? Both the end of the Pentateuch Harmony and the Joshua commentary cover farewell speeches of Israel’s leaders. Did Calvin compare the Old Testament prophets and leaders with the preachers of Geneva? The academic discussion of Calvin’s perception of himself as a prophet is taken up in the discussion of his self-awareness in the last year of collegial exposition of the Bible

Calvijns uitleg van Romeinen 9-11 tegen de achtergrond van de geschiedenis van de exegese van Origenes tot de Glossa ordinaria

The purpose of this article is to listen to John Calvin’s view on the place of Israel from his exegesis of Romans 9-11, against the backdrop of the history of Christian exegesis of this same passage. After establishing that Calvin’s view of Israel and the Jews was primarily determined by his biblical exegesis (and not so much by any noteworthy interaction with the Jews of his time), the historical voices of Origen, Ambrose, Augustine, Pelagius and Glossa Ordinaria are explored. In the last part Calvin’s exegesis of Romans 9-11 is investigated. This investigation makes clear that Calvin is not caught up in a dogmatic discussion of predestination, but that he rather focuses on Paul’s preaching with regards to Israel. There is the scandalum of Israel’s unbelief whereby the visible body of the people of Israel has been generally rejected. But this is not a complete rejection. The secret election of God means that there is still an adoption, which is completely grounded in God’s grace. Calvin has a broad understanding of ‘Israel’ which includes both Jewish and gentile Christians. But for the reformer of Geneva the Jews always remain the firstborn in God’s house. Regarding the Jewish people as a collective, Calvin does not harbour any particular expectations. OpsommingDie doel van hierdie artikel is om te luister na Johannes Calvyn se visie op die plek van Israel vanuit sy eksegese van Romeine 9-11, teen die agtergrond van die geskiedenis van die Christelike Bybeluitleg van dieselfde gedeelte. Nadat vasgestel is dat Calvyn se visie op Israel en die Jode primêr bepaal is deur sy Bybeluitleg (en nie soseer deur enige noemenswaardige omgang met die Jode van sy tyd nie), klink agtereenvolgens die stemme van Origenes, Ambrosius, Augustinus, Pelagius en die Glossa Ordinaria. In die laaste gedeelte word Calvyn se eksegese van Romeine 9-11 ondersoek. Hierdie ondersoek maak duidelik dat Calvyn nie vasgevang is in ’n dogmatiese behandeling van die uitverkiesing nie, maar dat hy eerder die aandag rig op Paulus se prediking met betrekking tot Israel. Deur die scandalum van Israel se ongeloof is daar ’n algemene verwerping van die sigbare volk. Maar dit is geen algehele verwerping nie. Die geheime uitverkiesing van God beteken dat daar steeds ’n aanneming is, wat volledig in God se genade gegrond is. Calvyn het ’n breë verstaan van ‘Israel’ – dit sluit sowel Joodse Christene as Christene uit die heidendom in. Vir die Geneefse hervormer bly die Jode egter altyd die eersgeborenes in God se huis. Wat betref die Joodse volk as kollektief, koester Calvyn geen besondere verwagting nie. https://doi.org/10.19108/KOERS.82.1.235

Guy de Bre`s’s "Le baston de la foy chrestienne": From Personal Notebook to Patristic Anthology (1555-1565)

Guy de Brès, who would become the author of the "Confessio Belgica", published his first work in 1555, "Le baston de la foy chrestienne", a florilegium of quotes from the Bible and the Church Fathers, that was intended as a guide for the faithful who were engaged in dispute over Reformed doctrine. De Brès, a preacher in the South of the Low Countries, travelled to Lausanne and Geneva (1556-1559) to further study theology and improve his Latin. The connection between his studies at both institutions, his work on three more editions of his book, and the sources of his patristic knowledge are discussed. A critical edition of his work, that preceded the composition of the Belgic Confession, is being prepared

Compatibility of phenomenological dipole cross sections with the Balitsky-Kovchegov equation

Phenomenological models of the dipole cross section that enters in the description of for instance deep inelastic scattering at very high energies have had considerable success in describing the available small-x data in both the saturation region and the so-called extended geometric scaling (EGS) region. We investigate to what extent such models are compatible with the numerical solutions of the Balitsky-Kovchegov (BK) equation which is expected to describe the nonlinear evolution in x of the dipole cross section in these momentum regions. We find that in the EGS region the BK equation yields results that are qualitatively different from those of phenomenological studies. In particular, geometric scaling around the saturation scale is only obtained at asymptotic rapidities. We find that in this limit, the anomalous dimension \gamma(r,x) of phenomenological models approaches a limiting function that is universal for a large range of initial conditions. At the saturation scale, this function equals approximately 0.44, in contrast to the value 0.628 commonly used in the models. We further investigate the dependence of these results on the starting distribution, the small-r limit of the anomalous dimension for fixed rapidities and the x-dependence of the saturation scale.Comment: 14 pages, 8 figures. Extensive revisions, several new results, plots, references and conclusions added; to appear in Phys.Rev.

De klassiek gereformeerde Liturgie 1.0: Uitbreiding tot en verspreiding van het zevental liturgische formulieren door de nationale synode te ’s-Gravenhage 1586.

The National Synod of the Reformed Churches was convened by the Earl of Leicester in The Hague in 1586 in a period of crisis. One of the Synod’s results was the Church Order, of which handwritten copies were sent to the provincial synods and classes. The synod’s second major work was on the liturgical formularies. While the ‘ceremonies’ in the Dathenus Psalter only contained three forms, Synod 1586 validated a shorter version of the formulary for baptism and composed four new ones. The present article studies how these new forms came on the agenda and how they were disseminated. Examples from the acts of provincial synods and a classis bring to light traces of the first impact of the ‘Liturgy of The Hague’, which brought the number of full liturgical formularies from three to seven, completing the upgrading of the reformed liturgy

4π4\pi periodic Andreev bound states in a Dirac semimetal

Electrons in a Dirac semimetals possess linear dispersion in all three spatial dimensions, and form part of a developing platform of novel quantum materials. Bi$_{1-x}$Sb$_x$ supports a three-dimensional Dirac cone at the Sb-induced band inversion point. Nanoscale phase-sensitive junction technology is used to induce superconductivity in this Dirac semimetal. Radio frequency irradiation experiments reveal a significant contribution of 4$\pi$-periodic Andreev bound states to the supercurrent in Nb-Bi$_{0.97}$Sb$_{0.03}$-Nb Josephson junctions. The conditions for a substantial $4\pi$ contribution to the supercurrent are favourable because of the Dirac cone's topological protection against backscattering, providing very broad transmission resonances. The large g-factor of the Zeeman effect from a magnetic field applied in the plane of the junction, allows tuning of the Josephson junctions from 0 to $\pi$ regimes.Comment: Supplementary information is include

The chiral ring of AdS3/CFT2 and the attractor mechanism

We study the moduli dependence of the chiral ring in N = (4,4) superconformal field theories, with special emphasis on those CFTs that are dual to type IIB string theory on AdS3xS3xX4. The chiral primary operators are sections of vector bundles, whose connection describes the operator mixing under motion on the moduli space. This connection can be exactly computed using the constraints from N = (4,4) supersymmetry. Its curvature can be determined using the tt* equations, for which we give a derivation in the physical theory which does not rely on the topological twisting. We show that for N = (4,4) theories the chiral ring is covariantly constant over the moduli space, a fact which can be seen as a non-renormalization theorem for the three-point functions of chiral primaries in AdS3/CFT2. From the spacetime point of view our analysis has the following applications. First, in the case of a D1/D5 black string, we can see the matching of the attractor flow in supergravity to RG-flow in the boundary field theory perturbed by irrelevant operators, to first order away from the fixed point. Second, under spectral flow the chiral primaries become the Ramond ground states of the CFT. These ground states represent the microstates of a small black hole in five dimensions consisting of a D1/D5 bound state. The connection that we compute can be considered as an example of Berry's phase for the internal microstates of a supersymmetric black hole.Comment: 72 pages (60 + appendices

Dying Dyons Don't Count

The dyonic 1/4-BPS states in 4D string theory with N=4 spacetime supersymmetry are counted by a Siegel modular form. The pole structure of the modular form leads to a contour dependence in the counting formula obscuring its duality invariance. We exhibit the relation between this ambiguity and the (dis-)appearance of bound states of 1/2-BPS configurations. Using this insight we propose a precise moduli-dependent contour prescription for the counting formula. We then show that the degeneracies are duality-invariant and are correctly adjusted at the walls of marginal stability to account for the (dis-)appearance of the two-centered bound states. Especially, for large black holes none of these bound states exists at the attractor point and none of these ambiguous poles contributes to the counting formula. Using this fact we also propose a second, moduli-independent contour which counts the "immortal dyons" that are stable everywhere.Comment: 27 pages, 2 figures; one minus sign correcte

Pharmacological myeloperoxidase (MPO) inhibition in an obese/hypertensive mouse model attenuates obesity and liver damage, but not cardiac remodeling

Lifestyle factors are important drivers of chronic diseases, including cardiovascular syndromes, with low grade inflammation as a central player. Attenuating myeloperoxidase (MPO) activity, an inflammatory enzyme associated with obesity, hypertension and heart failure, could have protective effects on multiple organs. Herein, the effects of the novel oral available MPO inhibitor AZM198 were studied in an obese/hypertensive mouse model which displays a cardiac phenotype. Eight week old male C57BL6/J mice received 16 weeks of high fat diet (HFD) combined with angiotensin II (AngII) infusion during the last 4 weeks, with low fat diet and saline infusion as control. Treated animals showed therapeutic AZM198 levels (2.1 µM), corresponding to 95% MPO inhibition. AZM198 reduced elevated circulating MPO levels in HFD/AngII mice to normal values. Independent of food intake, bodyweight increase and fat accumulation were attenuated by AZM198, alongside with reduced visceral adipose tissue (VAT) inflammation and attenuated severity of nonalcoholic steatohepatitis. The HFD/AngII perturbation caused impaired cardiac relaxation and contraction, and increased cardiac hypertrophy and fibrosis. AZM198 treatment did, however, not improve these cardiac parameters. Thus, AZM198 had positive effects on the main lipid controlling tissues in the body, namely adipose tissue and liver. This did, however, not directly result in improved cardiac function

Plasma androgens and the presence and course of depression in a large cohort of men

Background: Hypoandrogenic men showed a higher prevalence of major depressive disorder (MDD), which could be ascribed to overlapping symptoms such as sexual dysfunction, or additionally to core emotional symptoms such as sadness and anhedonia. We examined whether androgen levels 1) differ between men with and without MDD cross-sectionally, 2) are associated with an elevated risk for onset of MDD prospectively, and 3) associate with all individual MDD symptoms, or only with hypogonadism overlapping symptoms. Methods: In 823 men (mean age 43.5 years), baseline plasma levels of total testosterone, 5α-dihydrotestosterone (5α-DHT), and androstenedione were determined with liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry, and dehydroepiandrosterone-sulphate (DHEAS) and sex hormone binding globulin with radioimmunoassay, whereas free testosterone was calculated. MDD status was assessed at baseline and after two years using structured interviews and individual MDD symptoms were self-rated at baseline, and after one and two years. Results: None of the androgen levels were associated with current or onset (incidence or recurrence) of MDD. Free testosterone was only inversely associated with interest in sex. Also, androstenedione and DHEAS were positively associated with some individual MDD symptoms, and 5α-DHT levels showed non-linear associations (both with low and high levels) with MDD symptom severity and several individual MDD symptoms. Conclusions: These results support the idea that circulating androgens synthesised by the testes are of limited clinical relevance to MDD in adult men, but levels of androstenedione, DHEAS and 5α-DHT may be associated with some individual MDD symptoms