Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Although the events are, of course, not perfectly parallel, Luke in his gospel intends us to connect Jesus’ birth from the womb and His re-birth from the tomb. Luke 1:27 introduces us to Joseph and in verse 30 we learn that his betrothed wife was named Mary. An angel appeared…
The apostle Matthew is also known as Levi son of Alphaeus. While not much is said about this man, the few things that are told us are significant. Matthew in Greek is Matthaios and comes from the Hebrew name Mattithiah, or Mattith-Yah, "Gift of Yah(weh)." Matthew’s other name is Levi,…
Theologians often speak of "special" and "general" revelation, or of "natural" and "supernatural" revelation, or of "word" and "deed" revelation. While there are many worthwhile insights in these discussions, particularly in the discussions in Cornelius Van Til’s Introduction to Systematic Theology , I have not found any that satisfied my…
Ezekiel’s 430 Years In Ezekiel 4, the prophet is told to begin his ministry by setting up a model of Jerusalem and lying on his side and prophesying against it. He is to do this for 430 days, a day for a year. 390 days are against "Israel," and 40…
The Feast of Ingathering in the seventh month of the Sinaitic calendar is also called the Feast of Sukkoth, of Booths, also called Feast of Tabernacles. I have usually called it by that last phrase, and it is the most common today; but there is a problem: A tabernacle is…
The End of Jehoiakim’s Reign We have seen that Jehoiakim rejected Jeremiah’s prophetic warnings at the beginning of his reign. Let us now make a year-by-year survey of his reign down to its end. In the spring of 605 BC, Nebuchadnezzar defeated the Egyptians at Carchemish. In the summer, he…
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T he “second Reformation” introduced Reformed liturgy and teaching into Lutheran Germany. This was seen by some as a continuation of the Reformation and a purgation of Catholic remnants. The effort to carry on “further reformation” led to disputes with Lutherans. As Bodo Nischan has put it, the hottest debate…
T he late William J. Stuntz spent his life studying the American criminal justice system. In a 2001 article on our “pathological politics of criminal law,” he lays out the institutional barriers to the fundamental reform that we need. Most descriptions and prescriptions for criminal justice reform assume that criminal…
I n her “new history” of The Reformation , Lee Palmer Wandel offers a stark, sobering summary of the shattering effects of the Reformation. “By 1600, Europe was no longer ‘Christian.’ Some places were Lutheran, some, Catholic, some Reformed. Even if we recognize them all as Christian, they did not.…
A t the American Interest , James S. Henry examines Trump's Russian connections. It's an unnerving read. Whatever his relationship with Putin, Trump “has certainly managed to accumulate direct and indirect connections with a far-flung private Russian/former Soviet Union (FSU) network of outright mobsters, oligarchs, fraudsters, and kleptocrats. Any one…
T wo hundred years ago this month, Jane Austen put aside her pen for the last time, dating an unfinished novel that has come to be known as Sanditon . Anthony Lane thinks the novel shows that, despite her physical decay, Austen had lost none of her powers: “Although—or precisely…
S ummarizing the argument of Walter Scheidel's The Great Leveler , the Economist reports: “inequality within countries is almost always either high or rising, thanks to the ways that political and economic power buttress each other and both pass down generations. It does not, as some have suggested, carry within…
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