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Writing

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

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Art

Toward a Biblical Definition of Obscenity

My copy of Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary (1976: not so new, really) defines obscene as (1) "disgusting to the senses; repulsive" and (2) "abhorrent to morality or virtue; specif: designed to incite lust or depravity." Definitions such as this serve a useful purpose only when there is agreement on what…

by Peter LeithartMay 30, 1991
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Biblical Studies

The Abomination of Desolation, Part 1

An Overview Here begins a series of studies in the Abomination of Desolation, or Desolating Sacrilege. This month and next I shall set out an overview of what I regard as the best interpretation of the phenomenon. Later essays will look at it in more detail. (The original form of…

by James B. JordanMay 22, 1991
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Biblical Studies

Advice From a Sojourner, Part 12

29. There are three things that are stately in their march, Even four that are stately when they walk: 30. The lion is mighty among beasts And does not turn back before any, 31. The strutting cock, The male goat, And a king with his army around him. 32. If…

by James B. JordanMay 22, 1991
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Biblical Studies

The Chronology of Ezra & Nehemiah, Part 4

We have seen that it is likely that the Artaxerxes of Ezra-Nehemiah is the same as Darius the Great. If this solution be correct, and I think it is, possibly there is another problem in Ezra that can be resolved by it. In Ezra 4:6 we are told that "in…

by James B. JordanMay 22, 1991
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Biblical Horizons

The Weight of Being

Czech novelist Milan Kundera, though hardly a household name in the English-speaking world, has achieved a certain notoriety in America in recent years, largely on the strength of the English translation and film version of his novel, The Unbearable Lightness of Being. 1 The Unbearable Lightness of Being — the…

by Peter LeithartMay 6, 1991
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Proverbs

Advice From a Sojourner, Part 11

24. Four things are small on the earth, But they are exceedingly wise; 25. The ants are not a strong folk, But they prepare their food in the summer; 26. The coneys are not a mighty folk, Yet they make their houses in the rocks; 27. The locusts have no…

by James B. JordanApril 22, 1991

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Greek Types

From the earliest times, Christians have offered typological interpretations of ancient myths. According to Marie Cabaud Meaney ( Simone Weil's Apologetic Use of Literature ), Weil revives this tradition in a new intellectual milieu: "Weil uses Christology as the hermeneutic key to these mythological texts at a time when people…

October 6, 2017
Empire

The Inevitability of Empire

"All political power," write John Milbank and Adrian Pabst ( Politics of Virtue , 332-3), "tends to become imperial." They see three reasons for this: "either to stabilise volatile 'backyards' (e.g. the United States in Central and Latin America; China in the South Chinese Sea; Turkey and Russia in the…

October 6, 2017
American Politics

Here Comes the Judge

Judge Roy Moore isn't cool. The recently chosen GOP candidate for the US Senate from Alabama flashes pistols at his rallies. He wears a cowboy hat and rode a horse to the polling booth on election day. He says nutty things, channeling wild, half-remembered rumors from the rightwing deep web.…

October 5, 2017

Diseases of Speech

One driving interest behind Rosenstock-Huessy's grammatical method is hissuggestion that speech the means for integrating the demands of the Cross of Reality, and for meeting the crises that arise at each pole of the Cross. Rosenstock-Huessy wants to rescue grammar from the grammarians, and restore grammar and language to their…

October 5, 2017

Grammatical Sociology

Speech arises, Rosenstock-Huessy claims, from shock. The beauty of the world, the “it” outside us, shocks us with amazement, and loosens our tongues. A command from another confronts us and forces us to say Yes or No in response. Suffering evokes the cry of the “I.” If we confront beauty,…

October 4, 2017

Israel In Rebellion

2 Chronicles 10 is a fall story. The Chronicler's long account of the reigns of David and Solomon (1 Chronicles 11-2 Chronicles 9) has portrayed an ideal. David and Solomon form a joint new-Adam, overseeing the Levites who stand to serve in the garden-temple, guarding Yahweh's bride, Israel. William Johnstone…

October 3, 2017

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