Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
For ye had compassion of me in my bonds, and took joyfully the spoiling of your goods, knowing in yourselves that ye have in heaven a better and an enduring substance. Hebrews 10:34 There is an old Puritan dictum that goes, “Sit lightly on the world.” George MacDonald places it…
As Genesis unfolds, God chooses a line of promise out of the nations. One by one its offshoots are peeled away as the story zooms in on God’s chosen people, Israel. First, the line of Cain is peeled away as Cain is sent out from the presence of YHWH. Though…
The following article was an address given to Anselm Presbytery (CREC) in the Fall 2024. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Pray with me. Father of Heavenly Lights and fount of all Wisdom, guide us we pray, by your Word and Spirit,…
At my age, I’ve given up on the fantasy of “keeping up.” Much of my reading is now narrowly focused, research-reading in service of writing projects. If you want bibliography on the ontology of artifacts in Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas (which you don’t), or the purity laws of Leviticus, or…
I have been reading, thinking, and writing about the Internet and its effects upon our identities, communities, polities, and discourses for nearly a copy of decades. In that time, I have encountered no book as perceptive on the subject as Antón Barba-Kay’s A Web of Our Own Making: The Nature…
Identifying the men Paul refers to as “enemies of the cross” in Philippians 3:18 turns out to be relatively difficult. Peter O’Brian speaks of “all kinds of suggestions regarding their identity,” and offers a list of interpretations: “moral libertinists, behavioural materialists, orthodox Jews, lapsed or apostate Christians—because of persecution, Jewish…
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L ambert Zuidervaart's essay on “radical Augustinian social critique” is, of course, mainly about Radical Orthodoxy. He devotes several pages to Graham Ward and John Milbank, highlighting the power of their work but offering some criticisms. He disputes Milbank's notion that the church is a “society,” claiming that this confuses…
L amber Zuidervaart thinks that Christian scholars have a “modernity complex” ( Religion, Truth, and Social Transformation , 222). He illustrates with quotations from writers from Groen van Prinsterer to Merold Westphal, and concludes that Christian scholars need “a nuanced sifting of what is intrinsically worthwhile and intrinsically problematic in…
N athaniel Rich reviews Arlie Russell Hochschild's Strangers in Their Own Land in the NYRB . Hochschild, a Berkeley sociologist, examined theories about the rise of the Tea Party and Trumpism, but, she writes, “I found one thing missing in them all—a full understanding of emotion in politics. What, I…
I n a TLS review of James Sharpe's history of violence in England ( A Fiery & Furious People ), David Horspool calls attention to Sharpe's account of infanticide in the 18th and 19th centuries. He claims that it was “an all too common last resort” in an age “when…
I n a scintillating poem, “Late Apocalypse,” Scott Cairns ( Slow Pilgrim , 214-5), Scott Cairns gives the sharpest, pithiest description of the contradictions of communications technology I've ever read. Cairns is playing off Revelation 1, where John “turned to see the voice.” Again and again the narrator of the…
A fter David installs the ark of the covenant in the tent he prepares for it, he sets up Levites to carry on continuous praise before the Lord’s throne. 1 Chronicles 16:8-36 is a long sample of praise. As commentators point out, the Psalm consists of three Psalms from the…
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