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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A friend, Bret Saunders, writes the following in response to my post summarizing Caputo’s account of the “postmodern turns”: “Caputo appears to have omitted the so-called ‘theological turn,’ such as is found in J.-L. Marion and J.-F. Courtine. Of course, this is because Caputo continues to deny that Marion’s work…
Pountain and Robins comment that Cool “is in the process of becoming the dominant type of relation between people in Western societies, a new secular virtue. No-one wants to be good any more, they want to be Cool.”
In their book Cool Rules: Anatomy of an Attitude , Dick Pountain and David Robins define Cool as “an oppositional attitude adopted by individuals or small groups to express defiance to authority - whether that of the parent, the teacher, the police, the boss or the prison warden.” More pithily,…
Over at the De Regno Christi web site (http://deregnochristi.org), we’re starting a discussion of the Federal Vision today. Participants include Doug Wilson, Richard Lints, John Muether, Daryl Hart, and me.
INTRODUCTION According to many translations, Jesus instructs His disciples, “do not resist him who is evil” (Matthew 5:39, NASB). This is mistaken. What Jesus says is “do not resist by evil means.” Jesus resisted evil, but He resisted evil by doing good. He calls us to the same kind of…
Reviewing Joseph Roach’s It in the TLS (September 7), Michael Caines cleverly sums Roach’s history with: “Now it is celebrities who have two bodies: the body natural and the body cinematic.” At the same time, he faults Roach for giving “relatively little attention to the techniques by which performers and…
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