Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Reflecting on the centennial of the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy, Theopolis contributor Tim Nichols asked Dr. Leithart and me what the five fundamentals of the faith were today . His thoughts went something like this: Back in the early 20th century, in response to a ruinous drift away from the historic Christian…
1. Introduction In this article, I delve into some parallels found in the scholarly analysis of two important literary works: the Testimonium Flavianum by Josephus ( Antiquities 18.63–64) and the Olivet Discourse in the gospel of Matthew (Matthew 24–25). These texts have been at the center of countless academic discussions,…
Over the last twenty years, our American culture has created a culture of obsession over trauma. This could be a result of publications such as The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk, which explores the lasting effect on health that traumatic experiences can have. Or it could…
The Beloved celebrates the beauty of his Shulamite’s lips, describing them as “a thread of crimson” upon a mouth that is altogether lovely (Song 4:3). It were easy perhaps to pass by this all too quickly, passing it off, if we attend to it at all, as a kind of…
This article originally appeared at American Reformer on October 29, 2025. Reproduced with permission. Why the West Was Never Meant to Be Governed by Law Alone Back in the early nineties, I was in the candidate process for Undergraduate Pilot Training with the Texas Air National Guard, hoping to fly…
In his book From Silence to Song: The Davidic Liturgical Revolution , Peter Leithart shows that David, the author of so many Psalms and the musician who trained choirs, instituted a musical and liturgical revolution of how the people of Israel worshipped. The liturgical revolution in turn was designed to…
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John Smart’s Tarantula’s Web , on the circle of intellectuals around John Hayward and TS Eliot is, according to Lachlan Mackinnon , an unrivaled “demonstration” of “just how ‘unpleasant’ it might have been ‘to meet Mr Eliot.” Hayward and Eliot were “extremely” intimate Mackinnon writes, but they fell out over…
Slash me with a glance and purge me with your gaze. Consume me in your flaming eyes, and set my heart ablaze.
A friend and former student, Pastor C.J. Bowen, writes in response to my recent discussion of Jesus as “new Phinehas.” The remainder of this post is from C.J. Having recently preached through the early chapters of Acts, I was bothered by the interpretation that the early church was unfaithful to…
How can Yahweh’s name be profaned? Can holiness leak out? In a recent Princeton dissertation ( This Is the Thing that the Lord Commanded You To Do ) Bryan Bibb notes that some qualities depend on the response of a community; they are socially constructed qualities: “personal qualities (like authority…
As many commentators have pointed out, Leviticus 25-26 form a single literary unit. John Bergsma ( The Jubilee from Leviticus to Quram , 82-3) calls attention to the inclusio on “Mount Sinai” (25:1; 26:46), and lists eight literary links between the two chapters, including a common concern for Sabbath, the…
The Void is one of the essential dimensions of humanness, argues Esther Lightcap Meek ( A Little Manual for Knowing , 35). The Void is the recognition that we might not be, which can arise from curse, betrayal, or from “a brush with death or fear, depression or danger, an…
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