Endnotes
1 Robin Dunbar, Grooming, Gossip, and the Evolution of Language (London: Faber and Faber, Ltd., 1996), 69. Dunbar’s original article was published six years earlier as “Neocortex Size as a Constraint on Group Size in Primates,” Journal of Human Evolution, 1992.
2 Dunbar, Grooming, Gossip, and the Evolution of Language, 77: Dunbar argues that “human societies contain buried within them a natural grouping of around 150 people.” The largest effective group size that Dunbar cites are American soldier units in WWII of about 223 (Dunbar, Grooming, Gossip, and the Evolution of Language, 75).
3 College life, whether or not it fits the template of Olivia’s experience, is the most common rite of passage for adolescents making the transition to adulthood in Western culture today (French scholar Arnold van Gennap wrote the book on rites of passage: Arnold van Gennap, The Rites of Passage, trans. Monicka B. Vizedom and Gabrielle L. Caffee (The University of Chicago Press, 1960]).
4 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 8:1 (trans., Jonathan Barnes, The Complete Works of Aristotle: The Revised Oxford Translation, vol. 2, Bollingen Series LXXI [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984], 1825).
5 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 8:12 (trans., Barnes, 1835).
6 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 8:12 (trans., Barnes, 1835).
7 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 8:12 (trans., Barnes, 1835).
8 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 8:1-6 (trans., Barnes, 1825-31).
9 It is worth noting that some parts of the Bible appear to be interacting with Greco-Roman philosophy in such a way as to impact how the New Testament speaks about God, virtue, and friendship.
10 Augustine, Confessions 7.9.14 (trans., Henry Chadwick [Oxford World’s Classics; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991], 121).
11 Augustine, City of God 18.41 (trans., Henry Bettenson [Penguin Classics; London: Penguin Books, 2003], 819).
12 Augustine, City of God 18.41 (trans., Bettenson: 819).
13 Matthew Levering, The Theology of Augustine: An Introductory Guide to His Most Important Works (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2013), 95.
14 As Levering describes it, “Augustine offers a pattern of biblical reading, of living the Scriptures, that invites us to enjoy friendship with the Triune God who has created and redeemed us” (The Theology of Augustine, xiii).
15 Augustine, City of God 10.3 (trans., Bettenson: 376).
16 Augustine, On Christian Doctrine 1.3-4 (trans., D. W. Robertson Jr., On Christian Doctrine [New York: Macmillan, 1958], 9): “Some things are to be enjoyed, others to be used, and there are others which are to be enjoyed and used. Those things which are to be enjoyed make us blessed. Those things which are to be used help and, as it were, sustain us as we move toward blessedness in order that we may gain and cling to those things which make us blessed….To enjoy something is to cling to it with love for its own sake. To use something, however, is to employ it in obtaining that which you love, provided that it is worthy of love.”
17 Augustine, On Christian Doctrine 1.5 (Robertson Jr.: 10).
18 As Levering describes Augustine’s thinking, “in loving our neighbors and ourselves, we should do nothing that is not also fully and truly love of God. If we were to act against the love of God, we would thereby fail also to be true lovers of our neighbors and ourselves” (Levering, The Theology of Augustine, 6).
19 Levering, The Theology of Augustine, 6: “With regard to our neighbors and ourselves, ‘use’ therefore signifies rightly ordered love rather than manipulation or instrumentalization.”
20 John Woodhouse, 1 Samuel: Looking for a Leader, Preaching the Word (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Publishing, 2008), 455.
21 Murphy, 1 Samuel, 203-204.
22 Murphy, 1 Samuel, 200.
23 Eckhard Schnabel observes that “disagreements are the natural result of different opinions regarding the most effective missionary strategies” (Eckhard J. Schnabel, Acts, Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament [Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2012], 671).
24 “While disagreements may be painful and the resulting separation less than ideal, God’s sovereign plan can still be at work, provided that the reasons for the separations are not personal prestige and power but considerations connected with the proclamation of the gospel” (Schnabel, Acts, 671).
25 James McKeown, Ruth, Two Horizons Old Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2015), 98.
26 As McKeown puts it, “It was difficult to shake herself out of this sense of misery…It did not occur to her that the Moabite woman whose company she had not wanted would be the source of relief and future hope that she so much longed for” (McKeown, Ruth, 104).
27Yet, as James Edwards suggests, “Preparations and hospitality are indeed important, but they are not as important as ‘hearing Jesus’ word.’ The gospel of Jesus reprioritizes all of life” (James R. Edwards, Luke, The Pillar New Testament Commentary [Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2015], 328).
28 Edwards offers a helpful explanation: “Mary has made the gospel primary, to which all other things, even hospitality, are relative. The primacy of the gospel is the ‘good part,’ for it alone determines the life of discipleship, and it shall not be taken from Mary” (Edwards, Luke, 328).
29 Relationships with the unbelieving are also important for helping Christians not to become isolated and to remain cognizant of the need of others to find friendship with God. Jesus calls his people to share the Good News (Matt. 28:19-20). We are not to be ashamed of the Gospel (Rom. 1:6)
30 Augustine, The Good of Marriage 1 (trans., P. G. Walsh, Augustine, De bono coniugali; De sancta uirginitate, Oxford Early Christian Texts [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001], 3).
31 For a book that speaks to God’s intentions for relationship of men and women, see Two Views on Women in Ministry, ed., James R. Beck, Counterpoints: Bible and Theology Series (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2005).
32 Augustine, Confessions 2.3.8-2.10.18 (Chadwick: 28-34).
33 Augustine, Confessions 2.4.9 (Chadwick: 29).