Sons of God

Sons of God (Heb: bənê hāʼĕlōhîm, בני האלהים) is a phrase used in the Hebrew Bible and apocrypha. When applied to men, the phrase refers to the righteous who become conscious of God's fatherhood to his creation. The phrase is also used in Kaballah where Bene elohim are part of different Jewish angelic hierarchies.

Hebrew Bible

In the Hebrew Bible, the phrase "sons of the Elohim" occurs in:

Deuteronomy 32:8 also mentions "sons of Israel" bÿney yisra'el (בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל), which is translated as the "people of Israel" in the HCSB, "heavenly court" in the New Living Translation, and "heavenly assembly" in the New English Translation. In some copies of Deuteronomy, the Dead Sea Scrolls refer to the sons of God rather than the sons of Israel, probably in reference to angels. The Septuagint reads similarly.

John Francis Wade

John Francis Wade (1711 – 16 August 1786) was an English hymnist who is sometimes credited with writing and composing the hymn "Adeste Fideles" (which was later translated to "O Come All Ye Faithful"), even though the actual authorship of the hymn remains uncertain. The earliest copies of the hymn all bear his signature.

Born either in England or in Douai, Flanders, France, Wade fled to France after the Jacobite rising of 1745 was crushed. As a Catholic layman, he lived with exiled English Catholics in France, where he taught music and worked on church music for private use.

Jacobite symbolism

Professor Bennett Zon, Head of the Department of Music at Durham University, has noted that Wade's Roman Catholic liturgical books were often decorated with Jacobite floral imagery. He argued that the texts had coded Jacobite meanings. He describes the hymn "Adeste Fideles" as a birth ode to Bonnie Prince Charlie, replete with secret references decipherable by the "faithful": the followers of the Pretender, James Francis Edward Stuart.

Francis Wade

Francis C. Wade (November 11, 1907 – July 6, 1987) was an American Jesuit and professor of philosophy at Marquette University.

Biography

Wade was born on November 11, 1907 in Whitesboro, Texas, where he was baptized in St. Thomas Church. He was the son of George H. Wade and Virginia M. (Ligon) Wade. He was educated at Whitesboro Public School and at St. Mary’s College High School, St. Marys, Kansas. He entered the Society of Jesus in 1925. He was awarded his B.A. from Xavier University in 1930, his M.A. from Saint Louis University in 1932, and his S.T.L. from Saint Louis University in 1939.

Marquette University (1945-1985)

Wade held several positions at Marquette University. In September, 1945 he moved to Marquette University, where he was to teach for 40 years. For the first eleven years he taught philosophy and religion and then taught philosophy alone for 29 more years from 1957-1985. Wade is best known for his teaching of metaphysics, rational psychology, history of philosophy, and in later years, ethics. In 1970 Wade was awarded the Pere Marquette Award for Teaching Excellence.