Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Higher critics have, for a long time, posited a Second Isaiah to account for the structural and tone differences in the book from chapter 40 on. Now, we do believe in a Second Isaiah, but believe that the form critics have generally suffered from a lack of imagination both in…
A couple of the most serious mistranslations in our Bibles are found in the book of Leviticus. The main reason these errors have gone unreformed, I believe, is because Leviticus is simply not studied often enough, so the problem has never been fully addressed. The first mistranslation is found right…
Thomas Kuhn’s book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions , is really a parenthesis inside of the larger reality of Christian history. Progress and forward movement inside of science is a footnote to the larger and more general reality of covenant renewals in both Biblical and Christian history. The fundamental mark…
James Jordan, in the June/July 1995 Biblical Horizons, wrote a very helpful essay, "The Great Hangover," the gist of which I entirely agree with. The theme of the essay was that the Church to move forward must shuck off the old husks of Hellenism, Rabbinism, and undo admiration for all…
Traditionally, the three offices in the Presbyterian churches have been teaching elder, ruling elder, and deacon. These have been associated with priest, elder, and Levite respectively. We have seen that the deacon is in fact an apprentice and assistance elder. We have also seen that Levites as well as priests…
John 7:39 interprets Jesus’ offer of living water as an offer of the Spirit to those who believe, "for," John continues, "the Spirit was not yet, because Jesus was not yet glorified." John was not making an ontological statement about the Spirit, as if the Spirit did not exist until…
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The late John Webster offers this statement about the relationship between Scripture and “dogmatic reasoning” about creation ( Christian Dogmatics , 134–5): Dogmatic reasoning is a further act of following in which, directed by the prophetic testimony and with the aid of the Spirit's sanctifying grace, theological reason endeavors to…
A nthony Kronman begins his monumental Confessions of a Born-Again Pagan with several chapters on gratitude and its shifting fortunes in Western culture. He describes the shift from a gratitude-based organization of social life to a rights-based society. Gratitude assumes that social goods come by gift, on which we have…
A haz of Judah didn't dismantle the temple, but he might as well have done. He cut up the utensils of temple worship, perhaps including the musical instruments used by the Levites (2 Chronicles 28:24). He closed the doors (28:24), which meant that the various rites of the temple ceased—lamps…
R obert Emmons's study of the “new science of gratitude” ( Thanks! ) begins with a discussion of what gratitude is and implies. To say thanks is to say “yes to life. We affirm that all things taken together, life is good and has elements that make it worth living.…
M any Reformed theologians have taught that redemption in history unfolds from a “covenant of redemption” ( pactum salutis ) between the Father and Son. As Francis Turretin defined it, the pact between the Father and the Son contains the will of the Father giving the Son as lytroten (Redeemer…
L utheran Pastor James Prothro generously allowed me to see an advance manuscript of his forthcoming Both Judge and Justifier: Biblical Legal Language and the Act of Justifying in Paul (WUNT II; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck), a revision of his Cambridge doctoral dissertation (see my summary of one of his articles…
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