Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Paul writes to Jews, “You who abhor idols, do you rob temples?” (Romans 2:22b) The English translation “rob temples” makes readers think of pagan temples. There was only one Temple for Israel, so robbing more than one would indicate other temples are in view. And if the Jews wanted to…
Two offerings Humanity’s first vocation involves guarding and serving the trees that emerge from the ground (Genesis 2:15). God provides these trees to humanity for food. A serpent appears and tempts the couple to eat from a special forbidden tree, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Humanity…
At the outset of the Torah (as Christians understand it), a triune God creates the heavens and earth over the course of a seven-day week. Why? What’s the connection between the three and the seven? Could a triune God have created the world over any period of time he chose?…
How relevant to the modern reader are the flying axe head of Deuteronomy 19:5 and the roof parapet of Deuteronomy 22:8? Indeed, how relevant were they to the daily lives of Israelites thirty-five hundred years ago? Suppose that accidental falls from rooftops were exceedingly uncommon in ancient Israel, or that…
1 For most of my life, the standing of the American church as a source of national social and political order was measured by reports from the front of the so-called “culture wars.” 2 Memory brings to mind battles over feminism and the ERA, so-called gay rights, the breakdown of…
But when Herod died, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt, saying, ‘Rise, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel…’ And he went and lived in a city called Nazareth, so that what was spoken by the…
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Amid the swirl of sexual harassment charges, Claire Dederer asks what we ought to do with the art of monstrous men. It's not a side issue. Many of the geniuses in the history of art have been monstrous. Dederer even ventures that monstrosity is inherent in artistic achievement. You need…
Things are not as they should be, and Judah calls for Yahweh to descend to help. Rip the heavens, shake the earth, boil the sea; tear the three-story house of the universe apart brick by brick, but come down to help! (Isaiah 64). Judah has come to acknowledge that she’s…
The following is snipped from my essay in The Words of the Wise are like Goads . The imagery of Ecclesiastes 7 hooks back to the imagery of Lady Folly from the early chapters of Proverbs, the exhortation to delight in the woman you love leans toward the Song of…
Calum Carmichael is one of the most inventive biblical scholars around. He has made his career with studies of the interaction of narrative and law in the Old Testament, arguing, for instance, that the Levitical rules of consanguinity represent judgments on the practice of the patriarchs. It's not entirely persuasive,…
The bulk of the Chronicler's account of the reign of Abijah (2 Chronicles 13) is taken up with a long speech by the king, delivered before a battle with Jeroboam of Israel. Standing on Mount Zemaraim ("Twin Peaks") he calls Israel to return to Yahweh with a "Shema": "Hear me,…
For some, the "two kingdoms" political theology of Luther and Calvin is the essence of Reformation political theology. Francis Oakley argues ( Watershed of Modern Politics ) that it was an unstable early position that later Reformers couldn't sustain and eventually abandoned. Luther claimed that Christians existed "between the two…
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