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Is there a reason why theologians write like that? They even do it when they're writing for ordinary people.
If you don't know what I mean, grab a theology book and see how often you read:
- dense nounification of verbs like "the becoming", "being", "othering", "being the Church", etc,
- adjectives that sound like the product of Greek classes like "salvific", "pneumatological",
- Older English terms in the middle of sentences like "the mire", "despond", "thou".
I'm used to academic waffle but theology, which talks about God who deliberately went out of the way to be understood and to talk in words everyone, even the uneducated could understand, should maybe set the example for clarity and concreteness.
I think it's more academia in general than theology specifically.
During my sadly abortive tenure as a Humanities grad student, I got pretty sick of reading "foo qua foo" and "rôle" in academic articles. Lots of silly "ain't I smart?" filler words like that.
At least "X qua X" has some philosophical and historical backing, even though it is just as easy to say "as" as "qua," and doesn't convey any less meaning.
I could never find the origin of the custom of using "rôle," and it's literally just the French word for "role."
Obnoxious. 
@CharismaticBatman @multilingualchurch I really wonder whether the point is not to obscure, so that one's own sloppy thought may not be detected.
Well, I'd call it puffery before I'd call it obfuscation, but in many cases, it wouldn't surprise me.
The thing is, the mind can adapt to such language to the point that it becomes natural.
*cough* Hegel *cough*
@CharismaticBatman @royal Have you read Habermas?
@multilingualchurch @royal
I have not. What are they like?
@CharismaticBatman @royal Apparently Jürgen Habermas wrote lots of deep and meaningful writings. I have tried to read some. It flew over my head higher than a Chinese "weather balloon".
Ah, I thought you might have been referring to Gary Habermas ^___^
Any idea where I could get started on Jürgen? I love a challenge ^__^
Edit: I keep forgetting that I have to backslash escape caret symbols in my favorite emoticon when using Markdown. :/
@CharismaticBatman @royal Try "Democracy and the Public Sphere" and "Truth and Justification".
Sounds like a good excuse for a day visit to my University Library that I've been longing to do for a couple years now.
I so miss Uni. 
@CharismaticBatman @royal I'm near our National Library. Once you learn the system, everything opens up.
You mean the library system? Like how the stacks are organized?
@CharismaticBatman @royal You don't get to see the stacks there. I was thinking more about how to put in a reservation, how to find related books and when book drops happen as it's reference only.
Oh man, I couldn't deal with a hidden-stacks library. It's just not the same. There's something so soothing about walking the stacks and laying hands on a random book.
Both of my parents were professors, and I grew up spending a lot of time on campus (and specifically at the huge Perry-Castañeda Library) at UT Austin.
Big libraries always feel like home to me. More so than home, haha. ^___^
@CharismaticBatman @royal In the case of the National Library of Scotland, it's because they are a legal deposit library so if it was published in Scotland, they have a copy. A big chunk of their books are one of a few left in the world. Borrowing is forbidden but, if they happen to not have a book, they have ways of getting a copy.
I do love stack browsing too though. Looking forward to my uni library letting alumni back in.
That's really neat.
I'd love to see an electronic library like you see at the Jedi Temple in the Star Wars movies and animated series.
A library that is hidden-stacks-only should have digital rights to all their books and have some kind of virtual stacks where you can peruse any section you like on huge display screens, tap on a book spine that looks interesting, and read through it right there.
I was actually thinking this through in the shower this morning, lol. I'd have several virtual aisles of display screen "shelves," let the patron select which logical aisle they want (say, all historical fiction, or all linguistics texts, or even all works of C.S. Lewis), then peruse the virtual aisle, tapping on book spines, and reading through them. If they want to actually stop and read a book, they could swipe the book into an NFC button as a cart (no login id! only a physical button), then take that button to a viewing station that has a touchscreen at a comfortable reading angle. They could then sit and read through their selection of books while at the library.
@CharismaticBatman @royal I like physical books. I love putting in my order and then getting them from the desk in the reading room.
Yes, there's no really good replacement for a physical book.
eBooks during the era of #Skeumorphism got close, but now they're more abstract than ever. Not the same feel, by a long shot.