Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Why there is more to Jephthah than meets than eye It was not that long ago that I realized the Jephthah-story and the Jesus-story were basically the same story. Sounds crazy, I know. But here is a one-paragraph synopsis of both: The people of God have gone their own way,…
G.K. Chesterton famously said that the Gospels don’t reveal Jesus’ mirth. It’s true we never catch Jesus laughing. But can we believe He never did? I don’t think so. Laughter is human, and Jesus was fully human. Jesus promised that those who mourned would laugh. He mourned; would He not…
Matthew 2 has all the elements of an exodus story. There’s a murderous king, who slaughters Jewish babies. There’s a infant who will be Israel’s future deliverer, saved from the murderous king so He can later return to save His people and lead them to the Promised land. There’s an…
The calendar of Israel was primarily theological, centered on commemorating the salvific acts of God, but also agricultural, celebrating the creation-restoring effects of those salvific acts. The feasts of the first month celebrated the reviving of the world in the Spring, and typified the cutting off of the Savior in…
The chiastic shape corresponds to the shape of human life. This should not surprise us, because we are made in the image of God, and God is manifest in Word and Spirit. If we are living epistles, our lives will look a bit like the literary shape of the books…
Back in January, Venkatesh Rao wrote a fascinating post on the Ribbonfarm blog, discussing different forms of models of narrative. Engaging with Ursula LeGuin’s talk ‘The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction’ , Rao explores her contrast between the (male) ‘hero narrative’ and the (female) ‘carrier-bag story’, and suggests a third…
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Greek and Roman Animal Sacrifice , edited by Christopher Faraone and F.S. Naiden, is divided into four sections: modern treatments of sacrifice, Greek and Roman sacrificial practice, representations in visual arts, and sacrifice in Greek comedy and tragedy. Bruce Lincoln opens with an informative survey of modern theories of sacrifice…
People who work in the tech industry pride themselves on their long hours and work ethics. It may backfire, warns Michael Thomsen. He cites studies that link sleep deprivation with declines in “divergent” thought, “weakened long-term memory, impaired decision-making abilities and lessened visuomotor performance.” “How,” Thomsen asks, “can any work…
A tidbit from E.P. Evans’s Criminal Prosecution and the Capital Punishment of Animals (18-19). “It is said that Bartholomew Chassenee, a distinguished French jurist of the sixteenth century . . . made his reputation at the bar as counsel for some rats, which had been put on trial before the…
Barbara Kowalzig ( Singing for the Gods , 5) observes that “Choral song was everywhere in the Greek world, and even if we attempt to avoid the risk of viewing the entirety of Greek civilization through the choral lens, it is nevertheless clear that dancing in the Greek khoros was…
A TLS review of two books of the Cambridge Companion to Cormac McCarthy notes the hints of holiness in his novels: “Often in his work, however, there are residual glimmers of the numinous. McCarthy, who was raised a Roman Catholic, is often read as an unconventional religious writer, or Christian…
Stephen Walsh’s Musorgsky and His Circle tells the story of the moguchaya kuchka the “Might Little Heap” of Russian intellectuals surrounding Musorgsky - César Cui, Alexander Borodin, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, and Mily Balakirev. In his TLS review of the book, Paul Griffiths points to the inspiration that the circle drew from…
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