Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
And through the hands of the apostles many signs and wonders were done among the people. And they were all with one accord in Solomon's Porch. Yet none of the rest dared join them, but the people esteemed them highly. Acts 5:12-13 When Grandma needed healing, her children knew the…
Like certain kinds of music, the unchanging rhythm of Aquinas's Summa gets into your bones. Read a few sections and it begins to run through your head. You start drumming your fingers, humming, swaying gently to the rhythm of Videtur-Sed Contra-Responsio, Videtur-Sed Contra-Responsio, “It seems-On the contrary-I answer.” The only…
And Arpachshad lived thirty-five years, and became the father of Shelah . . . And Shelah lived thirty years, and became the father of Eber . . . and Eber lived thirty-four years and became the father of Peleg . . . and Peleg lived thirty years, and became the…
Of course, the title should be something like, “The Fall of the Angel Who Came to be Satan,” but that and other more accurate titles are too cumbersome. The question is: who is Satan, and when and how did he become “Satan” (Adversary, Accuser) and the “devil” (slanderer)? By my…
In The Oddness of the Feast of Booths , we saw that the Feast of Booths is a commemoration of the first encampment of Israel at Sukkoth (Booths) in Exodus 12:37, almost certainly the first celebration of the week of Unleavened Bread after the first Passover. The Feast of Booths…
This piece was originally published in 1989. 1. The Blessed Hope "Looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus." Titus 2:13 I was recently asked how I as a postmillennialist would preach on "The Blessed Hope." This is often…
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N.T. Wright regularly points out how Paul inserts Jesus into the Shema in 1 Corinthians 8:6. “There is but one God, the Father,” he begins, and as a Jew there he would have ended. Instead, he adds, “and one Lord, Jesus Christ.” Hear, O Israel, the God is one, and…
In an essay challenging the widespread notion that Tyconius was a millennialist, Paula Fredriksen notes the connections between eschatology and politics in the early church: “Diving the signs of the End in a period of Imperial persecution gave many of the early commentaries a decidedly political aspect. Irenaeus, for example.…
According to Pamela Bright ( The Book of Rules of Tyconius: Its Purpose and Inner Logic) , the late fourth century was the “Age of Exiles” in the Western church. The Council of Milan (355), convene to deal with the question of Athanasius’s orthodoxy, ended with the exile of the…
Oecumenius ( Greek Commentaries on Revelation (Ancient Christian Texts) , 75) turns to more recent history to interpret the seven mountains-heads-kings of the beast of Revelation 17. The seven kings are not in order; rather they refer to the seven persecuting emperors of Rome: Nero, Domitian, Trajan, Severus, Decius, Valerian,…
The wounded and healed head of the beast (Revelation 13:1-3) represents, according to Oecumenius ( Greek Commentaries on Revelation (Ancient Christian Texts) , 58-9 ), “the death-bearing wound that the devil received on one of its heads . . . because of the reverent worship of Israel.” Yet this wound…
What ought we say about the gospel and Hellenism? Many things, but this seems like a fruitful line of inquiry: The gospel is the fulfillment of Israel’s hope. The gospel therefore is known only by its similarity to and difference from the history and faith of the Jews. The gospel…
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