Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
The Building of the Temple Solomon began work on the Temple in the second month of his fourth year. This was the year 2993, a sabbath year. He finished in the eighth month of his eleventh year, the year 3000, also a sabbath. (1 Ki. 6:1, 38). This is said…
The Bible expresses its chronology not only in sequences of years, but also in sequences of sabbath years and jubilees. This enables us to make a cross-check of our chronology, and when we find apparent problems, to refine it. If our chronology is right, we should find some significant correlations…
Adele Berlin, Poetics and Interpretation of Biblical Narrative Sheffield, England: Almond Press, 1983. This volume is the ninth in the "Bible and Literature Series" under the general editorship of David M. Gunn. According to its author, who teaches Hebrew at the University of Maryland, the book is an effort to…
V. Propp’s classic work Morphology of the Folktale (University of Texas, 1968) argues that one of the basic structures of folk literature is "lack, lack liquidated." A king sets out to look for a wife, and the tale ends with a wedding. Often, the hero sets out on some business…
Luke’s gospel begins and ends in the temple. It opens with Gabriel’s annunciation to the priest Zacharias (whose name, appropriately, means "Yahweh remembers") of the coming of a forerunner. Zacharias is performing priestly service at the time. The book ends with the joyful worship of a new priesthood in the…
Last time we arrived at the year A.M. 3960 as the date for the inauguration of the New Creation through the death, resurrection, ascension, and session of Christ, and the sending of the Holy Spirit. We also saw that this is most likely the year of Paul’s conversion. Fourteen years…
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Micah’s prophecy begins with an advent, a theophany, of Yahweh. Yahweh rises from His palace-temple (1:2) to tread down the heights of the earth (1:3). At His coming, this too too solid world melts and turns watery, formless and void (1:4). Mountains represent highly-placed people who are going to be…
Some of the most passionate passages of the Old Testament are lamentations over Moab (Isaiah 15-16; Jeremiah 48). Why so much space and energy for a relatively obscure nation? We can find the reason by glancing at the history of Moab. Philistia is better known, but Moab is actually more…
Like many Catholic thinkers, Charles Taylor sees the Reformation as a crucial movement in the formation of the “secular age” of his most recent most massive title. Little of his discussion is absolutely new, but it is pithy and freshly stated, not to mention profoundly challenging for Protestants. Taylor sees…
A little Christmas fluff, inspired by a 2008 NPR report. Thanks to my son Woelke for pointing me to the original story. Act 1 Phone ringing on an empty desk. Enter Santa Jeff, dressed in a red jacket and wearing a white beard. He answers the phone. Santa Jeff :…
On a misty morning in 1703, Peter stood with advisors and surveyed the network of islands that made up the only land mass around the area. As Orlando Figes describes the scene in his magnificent Natasha’s Dance , “With his bayonet he cut two strips of peat and arranged them…
No area of Christian theology has been subjected to more Enlightened scorn than eschatology. Eschatology is myth to end all myth, superlatively mythological: All human beings ever will stand before the enthroned Jesus at a final judgment, some transfigured into Spiritual bodies to enjoy eternal bliss while others thrown with…
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