Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
My copy of Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary (1976: not so new, really) defines obscene as (1) "disgusting to the senses; repulsive" and (2) "abhorrent to morality or virtue; specif: designed to incite lust or depravity." Definitions such as this serve a useful purpose only when there is agreement on what…
An Overview Here begins a series of studies in the Abomination of Desolation, or Desolating Sacrilege. This month and next I shall set out an overview of what I regard as the best interpretation of the phenomenon. Later essays will look at it in more detail. (The original form of…
29. There are three things that are stately in their march, Even four that are stately when they walk: 30. The lion is mighty among beasts And does not turn back before any, 31. The strutting cock, The male goat, And a king with his army around him. 32. If…
We have seen that it is likely that the Artaxerxes of Ezra-Nehemiah is the same as Darius the Great. If this solution be correct, and I think it is, possibly there is another problem in Ezra that can be resolved by it. In Ezra 4:6 we are told that "in…
Czech novelist Milan Kundera, though hardly a household name in the English-speaking world, has achieved a certain notoriety in America in recent years, largely on the strength of the English translation and film version of his novel, The Unbearable Lightness of Being. 1 The Unbearable Lightness of Being — the…
24. Four things are small on the earth, But they are exceedingly wise; 25. The ants are not a strong folk, But they prepare their food in the summer; 26. The coneys are not a mighty folk, Yet they make their houses in the rocks; 27. The locusts have no…
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Trump and Aristotle may not seem to have a lot in common, Carson Holloway argues that Aristotle's Politics illuminates the deep source of Trumpism. In Book 5, Aristotle describes the origins of political factions: “In general, he teaches, human beings become factious over equality and inequality. That is, political conflict…
Matthew Crawford is an advocate for the moral and intellectual value of manual labor. He argues in Shop Class as Soulcraft that “T he moral significance of work that grapples with material things may lie in the simple fact that such things lie outside the self. A washing machine, for…
Listening to Rod Dreher read the final paragraph of After Virtue , I was struck by MacIntyre's description of the political prerequisite for forming communities of virtue in the new dark ages that are upon us. Here's the famous passage: “It is always dangerous to draw too precise parallels between…
“Until the mid-1980s, green-felt table games such as blackjack and craps dominated casino floors while slot machines huddled on the sidelines, serving to occupy the female companions of ‘real' gamblers,” writes Natasha Dow Schull in her 2014 Addiction By Design . Slot machines were “often placed along hallways or near…
Comparisons of different religious beliefs and practices wasn't new in the 19th century. At least since the age of exploration, Europeans had been compiling long and detailed treatises comparing Christian with “heathen” religion. What was new in the 19th century was the formation of a discipline of comparative religion. In…
In an essay on “ The Intelligent Use of Space ,” David Kirsh observed that since we have bodies, “we are spatially located creatures: we must always be facing some direction, have only certain objects in view, be within reach of certain others. How we manage the space around us,…
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