Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Gambling The Bible nowhere condemns gambling, and so we need to be careful in our assessment of it. Let me begin by making a strong case against gambling. Then I will surprise most readers by pointing out that gambling may not always be sinful. The reader should bear in mind…
Tim Powers, The Stress of Her Regard (Ace Books, 1991). Reviewed by Jeffrey Meyers. Tim Power’s latest novel is now available in paperback. The story is set in early nineteenth century England and Italy, in the world of the poets John Keats, Percy Shelley, and Lord Byron. Michael Crawford, a…
A close supporter of Biblical Horizons asks whether it is proper and wise to get involved in all the boycotts that Christians are being asked to observe today. She raises the point that Paul’s advice about eating meat sacrificed to idols seems relevant to the discussion. I think she is…
Solomon began to build the Temple of the Lord in the fourth year of his reign, which was 480 years after Israel came out of Egypt, the year A.M. 2993 (1 Kings 6:1). Seven years later, in the year A.M. 3000, the Temple building was finished (1 Kings 6:38). The…
Several months back, a candidate for ordination was being examined for entrance into the Presbytery of which I am a member. The candidate had a good deal of trouble with the exam on the sacraments, stumbling badly as he tried to define the "nature of the sacrament." Apparently in an…
Exploring the influence of televangelism on American religion in his book, The Struggle for America’s Soul , Princeton sociologist Robert Wuthnow presents a typical, though hypothetical, case study: Mabel Miller. Mabel lives alone, thousands of miles from her family. She grew up in a Baptist Church, but now, approaching 65,…
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A trio of authors argue in the January 2004 issue of American Philosophical Quarterly that conscious desires are impossible. They begin with a distinction between beliefs and desires, showing that the difference has to do with the “direction of fit” with the external world. Beliefs (and perceptions) arise from the…
In American Jesus , Stephen Prothero traces a three-stage process that produced a uniquely American Jesus. First, Jesus was detached, through the awakenings of the nineteenth century, from the creedal and confessional Calvinism of Puritan America; then, scholars disentangled Jesus from the biblical witness, basing their faith supposedly on Jesus…
From Eugene Vinaver, on the development of Romance literature in the high middle ages: In the third quarter of the twelfth century, some ten or fifteen years after the disaster of the Second Crusade, a remarkable event occurred on the European literary scene . . . . A series of…
In the late twelfth century, the English writer Nigel Wireker produced the Speculum Stultorum , the ?Mirror of Dunces.?EIn this story, an ass, Brunellus, dissatisfied with his short tail, leaves home to visit the famous physician Galen to get a prescription for a longer tail. Galen sends him to Salerno,…
There’s a neat little chiasm in Luke 21:25-26: A. Signs in sun, moon stars B. on earth dismay among nations C. in perplexity at roaring of the sea and waves B. men fainting with fear and expectations of things coming upon the oikoumene A. powers of heavens shaken. A couple…
In this parable, Jesus tells the story of Israel using the image of the vineyard. As we saw, this was not an invention of Jesus, but goes back to Psalms and Prophets who used the vineyard as an image of Israel. In these verses Jesus says that the vineyard is…
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