Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Our creeds, taking cues from Matthew 28:18-20 and other biblical texts, speak of the order of the Trinity as “Father, Son, Spirit.” This order is evident in the order of redemption as well: the Father sends the Son, who ascends to heaven to receive and send the Spirit. Luke 1,…
The category of “relation” has long been central to Trinitarian theology, [1] but in recent theology it has become a transcendental, as many theologians have argued that relationality is the leading feature not only of divine life but of created life. [2] Human beings made in the image of the…
Listen to Trinity House President Peter Leithart discuss his article on the End of Protestantism with LCMS pastor Todd Wilken at Issues, Etc .
One of the keys to understanding the parable of the wheat and tares (Matthew 13) is to understand the time frame. Jesus is speaking in pictures and symbols about some period of history, but which? What’s the beginning, and what’s the end of the parable? Is Jesus talking about what…
Shakespeare wrote two tetrologies of English history, patriotically celebrating the Tudor monarchy by recounting its chaotic prehistory. Read in chronological order, Shakespeare’s English histories trace the depressing collapse of medieval politics, from the ineffectual but dignified medieval kingdom of Richard II, through the usurpation of Henry Bolingbroke, later Henry IV,…
The Heart of Liturgy What we call sacrament, the food-aspect of worship, is essential here. Biblically, sanctuary worship, or worship in the heavenlies, is always a “marriage supper,” always sacramental. The Papal Church made the Eucharist into a private act largely separated from the community of the church. Protestant churches…
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1 Peter 2:9: You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people chosen for God’s own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light. As Pastor Sumpter has pointed out, Israel’s priests were living…
The righteous man is a green tree planted by a river, the people of God are cedars and palms in the temple, the lover in the Song of Songs climbs his beloved to gather the fruit of love. People are trees, and trees are ladders to heaven. Jesus is the…
Kenneth Burke argues in an essay from Kenneth Burke on Shakespeare (p. 158) that King Lear focuses on the “paradox of substance.” He defines this as follows: “the quandaries whereby one’s personal identity becomes indistinguishably woven into the things, situations, and relationships with which one happens to be identified .…
My friend John Barach offers a further gloss on the Richard Wilbur poem I discussed here yesterday. He suggests that the final lines about the milkweed possessing the field allude to Psalm 37:9, 11: Those who wait on the Lord, the humble, inherit the land. And of course that anticipates…
Obama’s re-election leaves social conservatives feeling as if the earth trembled and shifted. Writing in the Weekly Standard , Christopher Caldwell explains why: Obama won as a values candidate. It’s just that his values are opposite those of religious conservatives. When Obama “set out to pick a fight with the…
I argued earlier this week that, as a matter of historical fact, Western economies have not been state-free zones. My question here is more theoretical and general: Is it even possible to have a state-free economy? Yes, at a small scale, in, say, a tribal economy. But then in a…
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