Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen (Hebrews 11:1). The famous definition of faith with which the eleventh chapter of Hebrews opens has received a number of different interpretations. The crux of the problem is the interpretation of the words translated in…
This essay is an exploration of one element of the final of the four Gospels, the Gospel of John. My thesis is that the Gospel of John answers the issue of "friendship" being a homoerotic category. It challenges the "Greek Way of Love and Friendship" 1 It is indeed the…
"And I also way to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades shall not overpower it" (Matthew 16:18). Matthew 16:13ff. has historically been one of the most oft-cited passages of Scripture. Throughout the Middle Ages, it was used…
Matthew 8-9 records three clusters of miracles, interspersed with snatches of Jesus’ teaching about various aspects of discipleship. Just as the Sermon on the Mount displays the authority of Jesus’ Word in teaching, these chapters display the authority of Jesus’ Word over sickness, uncleanness, the creation, demons, and death. In…
The association of women and wells in the Scriptures has long been noted by theologians, a symbolism closely connected to marriage which begins in Genesis and climaxes in Revelation. There is a lesson drawn in the water of wells that I’d like to explore, but before that I must trace…
Of course, since the Israelites had agriculture, Solomon was not paleolithic as that term is used today. But "paleo" is simply a prefix meaning old or previous , the opposite of "neo." In that sense, I wonder if we might understand Solomon better if we interpret his statements and riddles…
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Jason Zengerle has an interesting piece in the TNR on evangelical conversions to Orthodoxy. At the end of the article, he quotes Jordan DeRenzo, who converted to Orthodoxy when her Baptist pastor, Wilbur Ellsworth, converted. She says: “Coming to the Orthodox Church means that I am in communion with that…
For centuries, Christians have posed the dilemma of Christian theology as a problem of faith v. reason. That’s a non-starter, a concession of defeat, for it assumes that there can be such a thing as a faith-free rationality. But there cannot be. What we have is not a conflict of…
We fondly look back at the Council of Nicea as a solution to the problem of Arianism, and see the homoousios as the key to this solution. Things are not nearly so tidy. Robert Letham neatly summarizes the problems associated with the term in his recent book on Orthodoxy: “As…
Henry Chadwick notes, “Some Christians late in the fourth century, especially round Brescia, walked barefoot after the example of Moses at the burning bush or the prophet Isaiah who went barefoot for three years. Successive bishops deplored this, evidently in vain. Much ancient evidence records the axiom that for cultic…
According to a 1964 article in Modern Philology by John Nabholtz, Wordsworth intended his Guide to the Lakes (first published in 1810; fifth edition in 1835) as a corrective to picturesque writers like Gilpin. He intended his book to model how landscape writing should be done, and most critics have…
In a 1993 article in the Review of English Studies , Colin Pedley points out the similarities between the cadences of this passage from “Tintern Abbey” and Paul’s triumphant conclusion to Romans 8: My dear, dear Sister! and this prayer I make, Knowing that Nature never did betray The heart…
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