Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
The Blessing of the Father The narrative of the Exodus makes it clear that Yahweh is Israel’s Father. Moses is told to declare to Pharaoh that “Israel is my firstborn son, and I say to you, ‘Let my son go that he may serve me’” (Exodus 4:22-23). In contrast to…
When reading the Old Testament, the believer faces two dilemmas. First, there is a seemingly sharp discontinuity between the universal proclamation of the gospel to the whole earth and God’s singling out of the nation of Israel. Second, the New Testament says of Jesus that “there is no other name…
John 17 contains the longest prayer that we have from Jesus, and it shows us the intimate relationship between the Father and the Son in a way that few passages do. The prayer lays out the chiastic pattern noted by Athanasius (God became man so that man could become God),…
The following meditation on the incarnation is paraphrased and quoted from Karl Barth, The Doctrine of Reconciliation (Church Dogmatics, Vol. 4, Part 1) , pp. 185ff. In the incarnation, the eternal Son of God makes His way into a far country, and takes on the form of a servant. “But…
Peter says "baptism saves you" (1 Peter 3:21). Does the New Testament teach that "baptism justifies you"? I think the answer is Yes. That's a controversial answer, and demands some defense and explanation, but first some critical qualifications. No New Testament text states "baptism justifies you," so my argument will…
In his THI article “ Son of David, Son of Abraham ,” Peter Leithart notes that Matthew's genealogy “contains a summary of redemptive history.” This statement is only too true and one that deserves further elucidation. Biblos genese ō s. The first two words of Matthew's Gospel are usually translated…
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“The standard of living in Athens in classical times was high - and not just in relation to the period, but by comparison with almost any other society until recently,” writes Peter Acton in his recent Poiesis . Economic growth in Greece between 800 and 300 BCE was between 0.6…
Noah Smith notes a gap in the world of Star Trek: The Next Generation : “No one is doing business.” Food is free. Scarcity is a thing of the past. People work if they want to, but they don't need to work. Could this be our future? Smith thinks so.…
“Public theology” typically describes “theology that addresses common concerns in an open forum, where no particular creed or confession holds pride of place,” writes Kevin Vanhoozer in his recent The Pastor as Public Theologian . The “public”: in view is “society at large,” and so public theology takes the form…
In his Atonement: A Guide for the Perplexed , Adam Johnson calls the doctrine of the Trinity the “foundation” of the doctrine of the atonement. The atonement only makes sense in the light of a richly Trinitarian theology proper. Johnson shows how the Trinity is necessary both to explain the…
The introduction to Noel Carroll's Art in Three Dimensions is as good a summary of the development of the philosophy of art as one is likely to find. Follow Paul Kristellar and others, he notes that Art-with-a-capital-A didn't exist prior to the eighteenth century. Rather, there were various forms of…
Ted Cohen recounts that he began his research on Jokes by “dividing them into the pure ones and the conditional ones. A conditional joke is one that can work only with certain audiences, and typically is meant only for those audiences. The audience must supply something in order either to…
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