Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
If you’re a preacher looking for good commentaries on Ezra, you’ll struggle. Certainly to find ones that wrestle in good detail with the text. And certainly ones that don’t cost you an arm and a leg. There’s a good bit more for Nehemiah, which is odd, as the two are…
Quick thought experiment: try to pretend you’ve never read 1 John before. Read 1:1-6. Go ahead; I’ll wait. Now, on to v. 7: “But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with ______….” What word would you expect in that blank, based…
In my work as a Bible translator, I was recently checking our translation team’s draft of Genesis 8:8, which says of Noah (translating the Hebrew quite literally): And he sent out the dove from with him to see: had the waters lessened from upon the face of the ground? Part…
Just in case a reader may not know Weinberg, he is a theoretical physicist and the winner of the Nobel prize in physics in 1979, as well as countless other prizes for his research. He is also a prolific, lucid, and captivating writer. If you want to read something on…
Colossians 1:15-20 is a famous passage in Paul’s epistles because it is a succinct and powerful poem. It appears even to have been a hymn. Given the uniquely Pauline language — “reconciliation” is a term used only by Paul — it should not seem odd to attribute the poem/hymn to…
Stalker (1979) is a film by Andrei Tarkovsky based on Roadside Picnic by the Strugatsky brothers. It shows a day from the life of a stalker, a man who enters the so-called "Zone", an Alien landing site, where he leads people to a room that grants people’s innermost desires, which…
Showing page 55 of 309
Showing page 10 of 43
E nforcement of current immigration laws is a political prerequisite for immigration reform, whatever direction that reform is supposed to go. This is one of the points made by Peter Schuck in a dispassionate, informative piece on immigration in The American Interest . He cites the work of David Martin,…
S olomon knows that the temple cannot contain Yahweh. He can't be contained within the limits of earth, or even the “heaven of heavens” (2 Chronicles 6:18): How then can He be confined to a tiny cube called the “holy of holies.” Solomon also knows that the temple doesn't need…
A ncient conceptions of society were tinged by the potential for tragedy, a potential linked to the inescapable necessity of alterity, of encountering an “other.” As Luigino Bruni puts it ( The Wound and the Blessing ), “if happiness requires social relationships—that is, requires friendship and reciprocity—if friendship and reciprocity…
S olomon's prayer at the dedication of the temple begins with a prayer structured as a double chiasm (2 Chronicles 6:14–21). The first runs from verses 14–17: A. Yahweh, God of Israel, you keep covenant, v 14a B. to servants who walk before you, v 14b C. You have kept…
T he Mennonite theologian John Howard Yoder is best known for his seminal book on The Politics of Jesus (1972). Yoder’s writings about the Old Testament “prequel” to Jesus are less well known, partly because they are scattered in articles that Yoder never gathered between two covers. In The Politics…
T he ark has been placed in the temple, the Levitical musicians have played, Yahweh's glory has descended to fill the house, and then Solomon start talking. He declares the completion of the building (2 Chronicles 6:1–2), blesses Yahweh for fulfilling His promise (6:3–11), asks Yahweh to hear prayers (6:14–21),…
Showing page 179 of 2212
Your weekly digest for all things Theopolis.
