Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Part 1 We do not understand the role of women in ministry because we do not understand the role of men in ministry. We do not understand the role of men in ministry because we do not understand the church. We do not understand the church because the consumer culture…
1. One structure The Creation account (G1:1-2:4) conspicuously conveys meaning using the literary shape of the text. The narrative is told with formulaic patterns, repetitions, and parallelism. The Garden account is different. It is viewed as a separate text, with its own author, employing its own structure. This second account’s…
I was reading James Jordan’s Creation in Six Days while also preparing for Trinity Sunday in which the gospel reading is John 3:1-15. As providence would have it Jordan dropped an easter egg for me along the lines of baptism. In chapter 5 he points out, “ On the second…
It's true. There is no verse in the New Testament that commands or records an infant baptism. This poses a problem for some Christians. Those who only look for explicit commands, or those whose theology is limited to the New Testament, will conclude that infant baptism is not biblical and…
1. Goal This paper’s goal is to identify and describe a literary strategy employed by scripture, namely using two episodes that cover similar territory or themes using details drawn from opposite ends of a number of spectrums. Once described the reader may recognize numerous other instances of this strategy in…
Numbers 14 records the tragic story of Israel’s decision to rebel against Yahweh and Moses. Twelve spies had been sent into the land to bring back a report to Israel. All twelve spies agreed: “We went to the land where you sent us. It truly flows with milk and honey”…
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Douglas Rushkoff ( Program or Be Programmed ) argues that we don’t think enough about how our new technologies run, or how they are biased. Most of us know how to use software; few know how to make it, and we don’t think about how those who do make it…
The Balaamites of Pergamum and Jezebel in Thyatira have the same teaching. Both entice the saints to fornication, which much be a spiritual form of adultery, and to each things sacrificed to idols. These twin sins link back to the apostolic decree after the Council of Jerusalem, which forbade Gentile…
The church at Smyrna will suffer “ten days” (Revelation 2:10). That suggests a brief tribulation, but why ten days? There are various speculations, but James Jordan’s suggestion seems the most fruitful: The ten day tribulation refers to the period between the feast of trumpets (Day 1 of Month 7) and…
Policy debates today are often framed as debates over state intervention, pro or con. It’s assumed that we know what a state intervention is. Ha-Joon Chang questions this assumption in a contribution to Institutions and the Role of the State . Whether child labor laws, environmental standards, or immigration laws…
What’s new about New Institutional Economics (NIE)? In their editorial introduction to Handbook of New Institutional Economics , Claude Menard and Mary Shirley explain that NIE abandons certain assumptions of neoclassical economics, specifically the assumptions that actors possess “perfect information and unbounded rationality and that transactions are costless and instantaneous.”…
In an essay on sacred law in ancient Athens ( The Cambridge Companion to Ancient Greek Law , 67), Robert Parker assesses the scope and limits of freedom of speech and religion. He notes, “If one asks how tolerant of unorthodox teachings (and cults) Athenian society was in practice, the…
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