Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
The sin of Ham in Genesis 9 continues to elicit comment, since it seems mysterious. We read in 9:21-23 that Noah uncovered himself inside (the covering of) his tent, that Ham (entered the privacy of Noah’s tent) and saw his father’s (not “Noah’s”, n.b.) nakedness, that Ham told his two…
Recently the magazine Tabletalk published a series of essays against Calvinist theologian N. T. Wright. The black cover of this issue lets us know just how dangerous this man is. But how dangerous is N. T. Wright? Well, he’s dangerous to some people, but not to others. Let’s see: He…
You need to read Rob Rayburn’s defense of his presbytery to the PCA SJC (Standing Judicial Committee). If you’ve been out of the loop on this, that’s okay. But what has happened in the last few years is that people have made accusations against Peter Leithart, and in response the…
What does it mean to read the Bible as inspired literature? The method is not new nor is it uncommon in Dutch Reformed circles. Exegesis must be Christocentric, plenary (all the text serves a theological purpose), respect the context in God’s redemptive plan, and plumb the full literary depth of…
Reading in John Calvin’s sermons on 2 Samuel today, I came across this wonderful statement. This comes from a sermon preached on July 3, 1562, “The True Worship of God,” an exposition of 2 Sam. 6:1-7. Calvin is discussing the implications of the affirmation that Yaweh, the God of Israel,…
A great deal of confusion about the relative value of “virginity” and marriage can be avoided if one pays careful attention to the text of Paul’s advice in 1 Corinthians 7. The two most important observations are: 1) that Paul’s specific recommendations are made because of the “impending crisis” (v.…
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RG Collingwood has a whale of a time excoriating individualistic conceptions of art.  He recognizes a theological motif behind the post-romantic notion of the isolated artistic genius: “Individualism conceives a man as if he were God, a self-contained and self-sufficient creative power whose only task is to be himself and…
Hegel writes that the Trinity enables Christianity and especially Christian art to attain a concreteness impossible in Judaism and Islam: “When we state . . . of God thathe is simple One, the Supreme Being as such, we have thereby merely given utterance to a lifeless abstraction of the traditional…
PROVERBS 27:12 As we have seen repeatedly in our study of Proverbs, wisdom is a kind of foresight, an ability to foretell the future, an ability to see down the road. The prudent or “crafty” ( arum ) man can see the evil ahead and does what he needs to…
Henri Pirenne, in his Economic and Social History of medieval Europe, describes the regulation of economic life in medieval towns during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Pirenne is admittedly old news, and perhaps more recent studies have corrected some of his claims. The town government had two main aims: “publicity…
Ha-Joon Chang argues in Bad Samaritans: The Myth of Free Trade and the Secret History of Capitalism that highly developed economies impose unfair and hypocritical demands on developing economies.  In particular, the nations that control the international trade and monetary agencies require that developing economies open their markets to imports,…
A discussion this morning concerning the economic impact of the gospel got me to thinking about Byzantium.  What kind of economic system did the Eastern Christian empire, with its centralized state and luxurious capital, have? I found some help in Angeliki Laiou and Cecile Morrison’s The Byzantine Economy.  I include some…
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