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Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.

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Medicine

Fighting the Beast

Peter Leithart recently wrote on his blog about the verse from Revelation 13, "Who is able to wage war with the beast?" and I could hardly help but take special notice. These were exactly the words l had had echoing about in my own head recently. Of course the answer…

by Richard BledsoeDecember 4, 2014
london
American Politics

Laughing Along with Jon Stewart

I confess to mixed feelings about Jon Stewart. There’s a great deal about his work that I don’t particularly like. I don’t like his profanity, the worst of which is mercifully bleeped out before it makes it onto the YouTube clips that are my main source of snippets. I certainly…

by Steve JefferyDecember 2, 2014
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Homosexuality

The Marriage Pledge: A View from Dixie

The Marriage Pledge , authored by Ephraim Radner and Christopher Seitz and unveiled by First Things editor R. R. Reno, argues that the time has come for Christian pastors to rend themselves away from civil marriage. The Pledge argues that the fact that many states are now allowing same sex…

by Rich LuskDecember 1, 2014
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Psalms

Psalm 28 Commentary

Psalm 28 has an overall rhetorical structure that looks like this: lines 1-16, prayer to Yahweh lines 17-20, talk about the wicked lines 21-27, talk about Yahweh (center of psalm) lines 28-29, talk about the anointed people lines 30-33, prayer to Yahweh As is so often the case, the enemies…

by James B. JordanNovember 26, 2014
tools
Culture

Culture

A river arises in Eden, flows through the sanctuary-garden, and waters the world downstream. A spring springs up from beneath the throne of God in the temple, rushes over the threshold, and then out to the land, toward the Sea of Salt, where it empties and turns brackish water sweet.…

by Peter LeithartNovember 25, 2014
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Sexuality

Sex Trafficking and the Devil

On Wednesday evening, November 19, Justin Holcomb, Canon for Vocations in the Episcopal Diocese of South Florida and co-founder of REST (Real Escape from the Sex Trade) was a guest of the Theopolis Institute for a lecture on sex trafficking, given at Covenant Presbyterian Church, Birmingham. Dr. Holcomb's lecture began…

by TheopolisNovember 20, 2014

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Contra Faustum, I

As is well known from Confessions , Faustus played a crucial role in Augustine’s formation. As a young Manichean Auditor and devotee of astrology, Augustine puzzled over philosophical and quasi-scientific conundrums that he wanted to pose to a Manichean master. When Bishop Faustus visited Carthage, Augustine found him affable, humble,…

May 13, 2015

Contra Faustum, II

Though Augustine had the arsenal of the contra Iudaeos tradition at hand in responding to Faustus, he had become dissatisfied with it. After his debate with Fortunatus the Manichean, Augustine had embarked on a deep study of Paul and Genesis and came to recognize the weaknesses of this tradition, whose…

May 13, 2015

Contra Faustum, III

When Augustine turns to the typology of unclean foods in his reply to Faustus, he introduces a linguistic analogy that lays a foundation for the later arguments. Paul’s claim that all things are clean (1 Timothy 4:4) does not contradict the Old Testament, since Paul is talking about the nature…

May 13, 2015

Un-Creation

Revelation 12-14 roughly follows the sequence of the first half of the week of creation. The overall movement is from heaven to sea to earth. Genesis 1 begins with light, then the separation of waters above and below, the formation of sea and land. We can be more specific. Land…

May 12, 2015

Machen and the Monkeys

In The Dome of Eden , Stephen Webb wonders what might have happened if J. Gresham Machen, Princeton theologian and founder of Westminster Theological Seminary, had been at the Scopes trial. In Webb's account, Machen's main concern was to challenge the naturalistic presumptions of Darwinism: “Machen never rejected the basic…

May 12, 2015

Liquid life

In Purity Rabbinic Judaism (46), Jacob Neusner comments on the role of liquidity in the purity system: “Dry inanimate objects or food are not susceptible to uncleanness. What is wet is susceptible. So liquids activate the system.” A dead animal on a pile of grain contaminates only the grain that…

May 12, 2015

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