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Writing

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

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Culture

Why We Should Jettison the “Strong Female Character”: (Part 1)

The trailer for the latest Star Wars movie, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story , was released last week. Following the success of the revival of the franchise in last year’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens , anticipation is unsurprisingly at a fever pitch. As in the case of The…

by Alastair RobertsMarch 6, 2018
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Epistemology

Seeking Integration in a Fragmented World: Integration Requires an Integrative Epistemology: Michael Polanyi

The word, “integration,” can sound abstract, technical, unhelpful. But as I represented it in my first installment on this matter , I take it instead to be the central desire of our lives. We long to integrate life, and to integrate ourselves. I offered as a preliminary definition, that integration…

by Esther Lightcap MeekMarch 1, 2018
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How to Worship

Worship as Ordination

Anyone who has read his Bible straight through has done it. Admit it. When you get to those parts in Exodus that deal with the instructions for and construction of the Tabernacle, your eyes glaze over and your mind begins to wander. Measurements, lists of materials, meticulous details about clothes…

by Bill SmithFebruary 27, 2018
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Biblical Theology

Bread and Cup

This article is a continuation of James Jordan's article, " From Bread to Wine ". We will here investigate the use of the word “cup” for the wine. I suggest that the cup itself corresponds to the firmament shell between heaven and earth, and that the liquid in the cup…

by James B. JordanFebruary 22, 2018
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Atonement

Streams in the Desert

And there came a voice from heaven, saying, Thou art my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. And immediately the Spirit driveth him into the wilderness. And he was there in the wilderness forty days, tempted of Satan; and was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered…

by Arthur KayFebruary 20, 2018
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Biblical Theology

From Bread to Wine

In the Bible, bread (and beer, usually translated “strong drink,” liquid bread made from grain) is priestly and wine is kingly and prophetic. Bread comes first and wine later. Bread is alpha food while wine is omega food. You eat bread in the morning and drink wine at night. Bread…

by James B. JordanFebruary 15, 2018

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Reformation

Careening Toward Division

A s recounted in From Conflict to Communion , jointly produced by the Lutheran World Federation and the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, the Reformation was an academic dispute that careened into a division of the church. Apart from the first four theses, Luther's 95 Theses did not state…

January 10, 2017
Language

Is Language a Tool?

D aniel Everett thinks language is a tool, and has written a book about it: Language: The Cultural Tool . He develops his theory over-against the notion that language is the product of a biological “instinct.” On this Chomskyan/Pinkerian view, “language is part of our genetic endowment and that, because…

January 9, 2017

The Iago Problem

R eflecting on Daniel Craig's recent performance as Iago, Tamsin Shaw puzzles over the “Iago problem” in a secular world: “The concept of evil has fallen out of favor in our disenchanted world. Its religious and superstitious connotations are permissible in horror movies, but otherwise often deemed embarrassing. Without some…

January 6, 2017

Accidental Empire

I n a TLS retrospective on Kipling , Michael Holroyd notes the obvious: “By the time he won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1907 he was well known as the private soldiers' poet, and had achieved fame for beating the drum on behalf of the British Empire. The British…

January 6, 2017

Shakespeare's Oaths

I n her TLS review of John Kerrigan's Shakespeare's Binding Language , Emma Smith calls attention to the liturgical and sacramental dimensions of Shakespearean oaths, contracts, and vows: “Binding in Measure emerges as deeply theological and sacramental (‘grounded in the Roman military oath of sacramentum,' as Kerrigan tells us in…

January 6, 2017

Beware the Smuggler

A delicious 1964 poem from Norman MacCaig ( Poems of Norman MacCaig , 165), entitled “The Smuggler”: Watch him when he opens his bulging words—justice, fraternity, freedom, internationalism, peace, peace, peace. Make it your custom to pay no heed to his frank look, his visas, his stamps and signatures. Make…

January 6, 2017

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