Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Summary In what follows, I will consider the “year-stamps” employed in Scripture, i.e., statements of the form, “Such-and-such an event took place in the Xth year of Y.” In the process, I will suggest some ways in which the Biblical narrative might relate to events in the extra-Biblical world, though…
In the first essay on the parable of the Prodigal Son, I suggested that the problems commentators and others encounter in interpreting Jesus three-part parable are not accidental. These are not just problems in our ignorance of cultural background. They are intentional features of the stories —stories designed to poke…
The story of the Prodigal Son is perhaps the most well-known story in the Bible. As others have observed, it may also be one of the most misunderstood. In two short essays, I will point out features of this story that are commonly neglected, aspects of Jesus’ parable that might…
The parable of Lazarus and the nameless rich man is not an independent story. It is part of a long context that begins in Luke 15:1, where Jesus is eating with tax collectors and sinners and the scribes and Pharisees grumble. In response to their hardheartedness, Jesus tells a three-part…
The Bible is written so that even when a reader cannot pick up on what might be deeper or more detailed aspects of a text, there is virtually always a message to be heard. In the ancient world, where the “reader” of Scripture would likely be a church official facing…
The distinction between garden (or vineyard) and field begins in Genesis 2. This relates to the ordering of the formless world. Plants of the field are contrasted with the garden planted by God in Genesis 2:5&8. Later on, under the Old Covenant the Israelites will be required to keep their…
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Today, Christian thinkers suggest that certain versions of divine simplicity are at odds with Trinitarian doctrine. I'm one of them. It's not a new thought. At the very beginning of his explicit discussion of the Trinity, Thomas Aquinas asks whether there are processions in God ( ST I, 27, 1).…
Aaron and his sons have been washed, invested, and anointed. They’ve offered a purification offering, an ascension offering, and the ram of ordination. Blood from the ram has been smeared on their right ear lobes, their right thumbs, and their right big toes, consecrating their ears, hands, and feet to…
Marxism, John Gray once slyly commented, didn't emerge from a Russian monastery. It's a Western faith, transplanted to Russia and China and elsewhere. Marxism doesn't grow naturally in these exotic soils. Its program and promise depend on a specifically Western history of industrialization, which produced the great antagonists, the bourgeois…
Aaron and his sons offer three offerings during the ordination rite: A modified form of the priestly purification offering ( hatt’at ); an ascension offering; and, at the climax, the “ram of fillings” (Exodus 29:22; ‘ayil millu’iym ). It resembled a peace offering, insofar as Aaron and his sons eat…
Hope isn’t some optional add-on to life. To flourish, we need hope. Desperate hope, hope against hope, hope in the face of hopelessness, is the narrow path of life for human beings on the way. Without hope, without some expectation or drive for the future, we are imprisoned in the…
Acts 2 is a typologist's dream, or nightmare. It's overstuffed with Scripture. Pentecost arrives. Of course, Pentecost was an Old Testament feast, 50 days after Passover. It was the beginning of the harvest, a firstfruits festival, which fits Acts 2, since it’s the firstfruits of the harvest of the nations.…
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