Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
I just finished re-reading G. K. Chesterton’s The Man Who Was Thursday . I have in the past had the temerity to say that I believe it to be the best novel of the 20th century. Be that as it may, I still maintain that it is at least one…
And Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, “Behold, this child is set for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is spoken against and a sword will pierce through your own soul also, that thoughts out of many hearts may be…
I was inspired to write this article after reading John Ahern’s The Case for Shorter Hymnals first published on Theopolis Institute’s website on November 16, 2021. Mr. Ahern and I are writing with different audiences and emphases in mind. I am thankful we both share a mutual desire to see…
If you’ve spent any time in the social-media galaxy of Christian cultural commentators, you have almost definitely run across the Latin phrase Imago Dei . It means image of God . Why they usually say it in Latin, I couldn’t tell you. We saw it in the wake of the…
The Gospel of Matthew—indeed, the New Testament—begins with a list of names, and that list of names is introduced by this heading: “The book of the generations of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.” Why start like this? Why “the son of David” and “the son…
A blade is raised. A child wails. But the brow under the crown is untroubled. Solomon knows that the raising of the sword will reveal the true parent and the identity of the son. But how did he know this? Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice Isaac certainly bears some of the…
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It is sometimes argued that the Christological formula of essence and person determines the way to understand person and essence in Trinitarian theology. The incarnate Son is a single person, the Person of the divine Son. But this Person exists in two natures. The church rejected monophysite Christologies; Jesus has…
In his forthcoming Democracy: A Life, Paul Cartledge summarizes Aristotle's discussion of democracy in the Politics and the disputed Constitution of Athens . According to Cartledge, Aristotle “deconstructs or decomposes demokratia as such, that genus of ‘constitution’ as it were, into four sub-species, ranging along a spectrum from the most…
1 Chronicles 2 gives a family tree for Judah. The following chapter focuses in on the royal family of David. The overall structure is chiastic: A. Sons born in Hebron. B. List of six sons born in Hebron, with mothers. C. He reigned in Hebron for seven years and six…
According to Rowan Williams ( Arius ), the central concern is with the freedom of God's will. Arius insists that God is self-subsistent, and because he is immaterial he is “without any kind of plurality or composition.” If the Son is eternally with God, then there is something beside God…
In his book on Worship Wars in Early Lutheranism , Joseph Herl argues that, though Luther advocated congregational singing, the Lutheran liturgy remained a largely choral liturgy for the first generations after the Reformation. Along the way to making his case, he dispels some myths about the medieval mass. Contrary…
Alan Jacobs takes issue with Corey Robin's essay on “ How Intellectuals Create a Public ,” where he argues that public intellectuals shouldn't write for readers who already exist but “summon” a new public into being. Jacobs says that Robin writes a lot about summoning, which, Jacobs says, has two…
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