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Writing

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

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Coronavirus

Does Corona Compassion Kill?

The corona virus hit Western society like a Biblical plague — almost. Biblical plagues were actually much more devastating. Still, as Peter Leithart describes the present situation, it is a judgment from God, because the disease itself together with our political solutions brought about a social situation that fits Deuteronomy’s…

by Ralph Allan SmithMay 26, 2020
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Theology

Is Theology Useless?

“The achievements of theologians don’t do anything, don’t affect anything, don’t mean anything. What makes anyone think that ‘theology’ is a subject at all?” - Richard Dawkins One cannot be a Christian college president or seminary trustee (your essayist is both) without wondering if Richard Dawkins’s notorious take-down of theology…

by Alexander WhitakerMay 19, 2020
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How to Worship

How Should Churches Respond to One Another?

Nearly every church that I am aware of has adopted differing practices since the recent virus scare began. Some churches continued to meet during the state lock downs, and other churches left their building empty, meeting online through various video conference technologies. Some churches have gone back to life as…

by Jonah BarnesMay 12, 2020
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Fear

Fear

Fear is an inseparable companion of human life. We are afraid of illness and death, poverty and cataclysms, rejection and betrayal, failure and shame. We are afraid of the unknown, so in a sense we are afraid of the future and life itself. Unless we live in the illusory belief…

by Bogumil JarmulakMay 5, 2020
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Heresy

The Blessing of “Heresies”

In the title above, I put the word “heresies” in quotation marks because I would prefer that the word “heresy” be confined to erroneous beliefs about the Trinity and the Person of Christ, rather than be used broadly to describe any view that might be considered an error. 1 At…

by Ralph Allan SmithApril 30, 2020
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Fear

On Coping (or not) with a Crisis

I’ve been trying to work out why I’m feeling existentially disconnected from CoV-19-related fears. I’m taking it seriously, but it’s not registering in any deeply personal way. Partly it’s that my routines are largely undisrupted. But as I reflect on people’s reactions I think there’s more, because a lot of…

by Matthew MasonApril 28, 2020

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Biblical Studies

Incarnational revelation

Westminster OT professor Pete Enns has been a friend since he taught me German at seminary nearly twenty years ago, and as editor of the Westminster Journal he regularly published my work. I have raised questions to him in private in the past, and we have had our friendly disagreements.…

November 17, 2006

Cleanse, consecrate, atone

Jay Sklar of Covenant Seminary carefully examined the uses of various terms for cleansing, consecrating, and atonement, particularly aiming to distinguish “atone” (Heb kpr) from the others. He took aim particularly at Milgrom’s claim that kipper “means purge and nothing else,” and is synonymous with other terms for purging. Against…

November 17, 2006

Eternity in the heart

Brian Gault gave a carefully-argued paper on the meaning of “ha-olam” in Ecclesiastes 3:11 - normally translated as “eternity.” Gault ran through a number of possible interpretations of the verse, finally suggesting a repointing leads to a translation as “darkness” or “ignorance.” The point is that God makes the world…

November 17, 2006

Vestigia trinitatis

Keith Johnson gave a solid exposition of Augustine’s views on the vestigia trinitatis in an ETS session this morning. He argued that Augustine is not using the vestigia to prove the Trinity or as a “second root” (Barth) in addition to the economic revelation of the Trinity. In fact, Augustine…

November 16, 2006
Politics

True Toleration

J. Budziszewski gave a sharply argued and spryly humorous deconstruction of liberalism’s neutralist view of tolerance, arguing that liberal states are confessional states that pretend not to be and that liberalism leads to a disguised dictatorship (a plenary ETS session). He suggested that a confessional state that follows what he…

November 16, 2006
History

Purity

No doubt it goes without saying after the previous few posts, but Latour’s anthropological assessment of modernity provides a lot of ammo for a study of modernity that would treat it as the creation of a purity culture, as dirt-avoidance.

November 15, 2006

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