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Writing

Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.

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Biblical Horizons

Gordon Wenham on Ritual

In a brief article entitled, “The Theology of Old Testament Sacrifice," Gordon Wenham, expanding on a comment about ritual from anthropologist Monica Wilson, states: We resort to ritual when we want to express our deepest feelings. Consider the rituals used in greeting people in our society: a nod, a handshake,…

by Peter LeithartJanuary 27, 1995
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Biblical Horizons

A Postscript to the Meyers Thesis

Everyone here in Cambridge is talking about sacrifice. My supervisor, Dr. John Milbank, is working on a book on gift in which he is dealing with recent literature on sacrifice. The graduate seminar in Systematics during Michaelmas Term focused on the theme of sacrifice. The first presenter was Dr. Ian…

by Peter LeithartJanuary 27, 1995
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Baptism

Sacramental Efficacy

Protestant-Catholic debates about the sacraments have usually taken the form of debates about sacramental efficacy. Protestants claim that Catholics believe that sacraments work ex opere operato , virtually a magical view of the sacraments. A priest goes through the motions and says the hocus-pocus and "presto!" the sacraments confer grace.…

by Peter LeithartJanuary 26, 1995
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Exodus

Mansions in the Sky, The Meaning of the Tabernacle

When Israel came out of Egypt, she was a collection of tribes descended from the Tribe of Abraham. Tribalism drops out of history into the "world" by looking back to ancestors and by orienting to the spirits that govern the world. The world must not be manipulated, because to do…

by James B. JordanJanuary 7, 1995
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Revelation

The Angels of Revelation

Angels are the mediators of the Old Creation, as Eugenio Corsini has rightly pointed out in his commentary, The Apocalypse. For this reason, argues Corsini, the book of Revelation must have to do with the final end of the Old Creation order, which he associates with the work of Jesus…

by James B. JordanJanuary 7, 1995
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Biblical Horizons

Triune Revelation and Through New Eyes Volume 2

Our procedure in "Through New Eyes Volume 2" thus far has been to lay out the general overview of history and its meaning as the Bible presents it. My hope is to fill this out in four major sections, corresponding to the four ages and the four testaments in the…

by James B. JordanJanuary 7, 1995

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Vestigia trinitatis

In an article on vestigia trinitatis in early modern thought, Dennis Klinck notes that the early 17th century saw a flowering of Trinitarian theology in England. Theologians, poets, and others saw the Trinity reflected in political life, human psychology, every sphere of knowledge. They agreed fully with the Augustinian doctrine…

August 21, 2007

Donne on the Trinity

In stanza 4 of Donne’s “Litanie,” he addresses the Trinity: O Blessed glorious Trinity, Bones to Philosophy, but milke to faith, Which, as wise serpents, diversly Most slipperinesse, yet most entanglings hath, As you distinguish’d undistinct By power, love, knowledge bee, Give mee a such selfe different instinct Of these;…

August 21, 2007
Philosophy

Intention and action

In his summary of “identity description,” which he ultimately applies to Jesus, Hans Frei speaks of “the irreversible passage or movement from . . . intention to action. The enactment of intention always differs from the intention to enact; and each person has inside knowledge of how he passes from…

August 21, 2007
Literature

Jane’s tough world

In early August, Lev Grossman wrote a piece for Time on the continuing apotheosis of Jane Austen: “It was a cliché 10 years ago to say that the Austen phenomenon was big. It has now burst completely out of its bodice. Jane Austen, who recorded the last gorgeous gasp of…

August 21, 2007
Literature

Jane’s tough world

In early August, Lev Grossman wrote a piece for Time on the continuing apotheosis of Jane Austen: “It was a cliché 10 years ago to say that the Austen phenomenon was big. It has now burst completely out of its bodice. Jane Austen, who recorded the last gorgeous gasp of…

August 21, 2007
History

Slavery and self-interest

During his 1842 tour of the US, Charles Dickens met a southerner who tried to convince him that harsh treatment of slaves was against the self-interest of Southern slaveholders. Dickens’s response was devastating: “I told him quietly that it was not a man’s interest to get drunk, or to steal,…

August 21, 2007

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