Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
"Vanity of vanities", says the Preacher. "All is vanity". Life, we are told in the book of Ecclesiastes, is a repetitious, wearisome cycle; all that is and all that will be has already been. There is nothing new under the sun. What is crooked cannot be made straight, what is…
The Bible tells us that when God created the earth, He set up three zones of life. The first was the world itself. The second was the holy land of Eden. And the third was the Garden in Eden, God’s sanctuary. God told Adam and Eve that every tree was…
In our survey of Biblical chronology we have arrived at the books of Ezra and Nehemiah, which provide chronological information for the period after the return from exile, the Restoration Period of Old Testament history. The question we begin to address in this essay is whether the Artaxerxes of these…
These verses from the Sermon on the Mount are generally taken in connection with Jesus’ earlier statement concerning adultery in the heart (vv. 27-28); the eye and the hand have obvious relevance to the sin of adultery. At the same time, most commentators admit that the principle of avoiding occasions…
17. The eye that mocks a father, And despises to obey a mother, The ravens of the valley will pick it out, And the young eagles will eat it. 18. There are three things that are too wonderful for me, Four that I do not understand: 19. The way of…
The modern Church in America and virtually everywhere else is ideology-centered, not geographical. This is because various Churches believe different things and have different customs of worship and sacraments. The ideological Church has gradually developed from the time of the Reformation, because accuracy of doctrine has become more important to…
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In his just-published Imagining the Kingdom: How Worship Works (Cultural Liturgies) , James KA Smith quotes this remarkable passage from a speech by David Foster Wallace: “In the day-to-day trenches of adult life, there is no such thing as atheism. There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships.…
AJ Bandstra ( The Law and The Elementa of The World An Exegetical Study In Aspects of Pauls Teaching ) takes Paul’s distinguishes “heir” and “slave” in Galatians 4:1, the first referring to Jews and the second to Gentiles. Chapter 3 ends with Paul’s ringing declaration that those who are…
In his Life of Moses (II.20-23) Philo notes the difference between the law of the Jews and the laws of other peoples. Scythians don’t keep Egyptian laws, nor Egyptians Scythian, Asians and Europeans keep to their own laws. But it’s different with the laws of Moses: “They lead after them…
NT Wright has long emphasized the centrality of the prophecy of the temple’s destruction to Jesus’ ministry and teaching. But that has not been as prominent a theme in Wright’s Paul work. In Paul: In Fresh Perspective (56), he makes it clear that he believes “Paul is aware . .…
In his Paul: In Fresh Perspective (19), NT Wright notes that even scholars who have largely abandoned old methods and approaches to Paul cling to old conclusions about Paul. This is evident in their assumptions about the Pauline canon: “The extremely marked stylistic difference between 1 Corinthians and 2 Corinthians…
Mackubin Thomas Owens doesn’t think mixing men and women on the front lines is a good idea: “The glue of unit cohesion is what the Greeks called philia —friendship, comradeship, or brotherly love. In The Warriors: Reflections on Men in Battle , J. Glenn Gray described the importance of philia…
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