Week 3, Cobb Chapter 3

I was really intrigued by this chapter. The historical basis of culture as it relates to the gladiators killing Christians in the Roman coliseum and the early theater. The causal relationship and the historical influence that these events had on Western Christianity and it's views on entertainment and culture is fascinating. It was interesting in that Cobb draws distinction between Tertullian and Augustine and their two different views on theology and culture. Tertullian saw them as "discrete realities". Augustine saw them as "intertwined cities". This idea of intertwined cities resurfaced centuries later by Martin Luther when he saw the roll of God in culture as dependent on both God's will and the reception of the viewer. I think that there are certainly quite a few different viewpoints out there in the role of theology in culture. However, it is easy for me to see how a church father such as Tertullian would have been strongly opposed to culture and entertainment given that Christians were being killed as sport as popular entertainment.