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American Religion

Protestantism's Lost Soul

D. G. Hart’s The Lost Soul of American Protestantism vividly clarifies the differences between evangelical and Confessional Protestantism. In part the book is a manifesto for historians of American religion. Hart argues that historians of American Protestantism have operated with a simplistic binary contrast of evangelical/conservative v. liberal/progressive. At best,…

by Peter LeithartAugust 18, 2015
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Books

The Idiot and the Limits of Compassion

Dostoyevsky’s novel, The Idiot , like his other major works, is a complex evaluation of the human condition—a juxtaposition of the innate goodness and innate evil that resides within every human heart. There is much one can say about The Idiot . I am no specialist of Russian literature, or…

by Gerald HiestandAugust 13, 2015
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Homosexuality

If There is “Natural Law” How Can People Believe in Same-Sex Marriage?

At risk of violating some secret handshake agreement on some important nuance to “natural law,” I will sum up what I understand in my own words. As far as I can tell natural law is supposed to be an area of knowledge that all people should be able to agree…

by Mark HorneAugust 11, 2015
falling-star
Biblical Studies

Cosmic Language, 2

The first installment of this article may be found here . The Image of Man This brings us to a substitutionary atonement which we do understand, the fulfilment of the cruciform Tabernacle in the cross of Christ. Although Jesus’ execution was Physical and Social, it was primarily Personal . Beginning…

by Mike BullAugust 6, 2015
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Genesis

Every Noise Appalls

The first two essays in this series drew attention to the structure of the first part of Macbeth and to the way Shakespeare incorporates the Garden of Eden into his story. Macbeth , we saw, is a temptation story in which, compared to the Biblical story, the temptation itself is…

by Ralph Allan SmithAugust 4, 2015
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Revelation

The Warrior and the City: A Wedding Homily

Revelation 19:6-9 Then I heard something like the voice of a great multitude and like the sound of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder, saying, “Hallelujah! For theLord our God, the Almighty, reigns. Let us rejoice and be glad and give the glory to Him,…

by Peter LeithartAugust 3, 2015

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Three to Four

The Lamb’s worthiness to take the book is triple (Revelation 5:9-10). He is worthy because: 1) He was slain 2) He purchased with His blood 3) He made the purchased-ones a kingdom and priests The second and third of these meritorious acts, though, move out into a four. He purchased…

May 16, 2014

Potter, Clay, and Divine Repentance

In a subtle discussion of divine repentance, R.W.L. Moberly ( Old Testament Theology , 122-3) offers this complex reading of Jeremiah 18:1-10. Rather than a contradiction, he suggests that it offers a “striking paradox.” The imagery “strongly emphasizes divine power,” yet at the same time “we have a strong statement…

May 15, 2014

Pastoral Carnality

Gordon Lathrop’s The Pastor: A Spirituality is a wise and beautiful book, to be savored slowly. It’s not perfect; it’s marred here and there by a form of lefty Lutheranism. But it’s such a lovely book that it seems almost obscene to review it. I’ll limit myself to quoting a…

May 15, 2014

Ussher’s Soteriology

A recent addition to Oxford Studies in Historical Theology, Richard Snoddy’s Soteriology of James Ussher offers a detailed study of an important but neglected figure. If he is known at all, Ussher is known today as a chronologist. Snoddy’s is one of several recent works that shows the breadth of…

May 15, 2014

No Place To Hide

As legal affairs correspondent for the Nation , David Cole is no apologist for the NSA. But he argues in his Washington Post review of No Place To Hide that Glenn Greenwald undermines a compelling argument by hyperbole and his failure to acknowledge the limits on NSA activity: “Greenwald’s descriptions…

May 15, 2014
Atonement

The Cross in History

Theodore Jennings doesn’t think that traditional notions of atonement speak to the contemporary world. We are “no longer familiar” with the language of sacrifice, and that is partly because of Christianity itself: “the Letter to the Hebrews is an essay that largely aims at the destruction of the notion of…

May 15, 2014

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