Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
1 Chronicles 9:1 seems to bring the genealogies of 1 Chronicles to an end. The Chronicler has recorded the genealogy of the human race from Adam, focusing on the descendants of Abraham through Jacob. Summing it all up, he says, “So all Israel was enrolled by genealogies; and behold, they…
The “personalist” understanding of the Trinity, articulated most influentially in the work of John Zizioulas, has fallen on hard times. Recent scholars have attacked Zizioulas’s idea that Cappadocian Trinitarianism represented an ontological revolution, hammering on the distinction between divine and human personhood. Michel Barnes’s conclusion is the most drastic of…
Biblical Theology is often defined as the historical unfolding of God’s revelation, or of God’s revelation and of the history of his covenantal redemption and transformation of humanity and the world. In practice, Biblical Theology is usually broader than this, and also includes the study of literary structure and of…
We are made to be happy. Created to enter into the eternal joy of God, our whole being inclines to that end, but the fallen world has put forth barriers and by our own sin we bar ourselves from that endless delight, and death blinds us to that reality. Yet…
At the end of Revelation, John sees the heavenly city descending to earth. The city shines with the brilliance of God's glory, which lightens the nations, so that kings bring their glory to the city. This is not a vision of the final new heaven and new earth. It's a…
“No one has ever seen God,” writes John (John 1:18). If this is the case, then how can we speak about God? Some people say we actually cannot. Or at least we cannot speak about God positively, i.e. who He is. We can only say who or what God is…
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Jesus chooses a couple of sets of brothers to be among the Twelve: Andrew and Peter, James and John. Plus, there’s Thomas the Twin. Why did Jesus do this? Possibly, because the Old Testament so often shows us brothers in conflict, especially older brothers hating and abusing younger brothers, while…
In his 1676 parody, La Terre australe connue , Gabriel de Foigny describes the rationality and simplification of the Austral language, which works somewhat like chemical formula. All words are monosyllabic, and each letter is associated with either a substance (the vowels, which match the four classical elements, plus salt!)…
Linguistic values arise from differences between linguistic items in a system, Saussure argues. But on what basis do we conclude that those differences are differences between items at one moment? What can’t value and meaning arise in the difference between a word’s value now and a word’s value a century…
Saussure also suggests that phonetic changes sometimes have the effect of obliterating the distinct parts of composite words. Latin’s amicus (“friend”) was clearly negated by inimicus (“enemy”), but the French ami and ennemi are no longer so obviously related by derivation. Again, breaking of these historical links between words has…
Saussure notes that phonetic changes in a language can have wider consequences on a language. One of these effects is “to break the grammatical link connecting two or more words.” Where linguistic signs once wore their derivation on their sound, a phonetic change breaks the link. In Latin, house-house is…
Tom Perrotta creates a background buzz of sexuality in his 1998 novel Election . It’s appropriate to the story’s setting - an election for Winwood High’s student body president. What’s remarkable is how deftly he achieves this - mostly by gesturing and leaving a great deal unstated. We don’t know…
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