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Ephesians

Music and Drunkenness, Part 2

For Part 1, click HERE . How did Paul’s earliest commentators view his juxtaposition of music and drunkenness, and did they connect it to the ancient Greek ideas of musical ethos described in Part I? Origen, one of the earliest commentators on Paul, writes about Ephesians 5:18-19: One, however, who…

by John AhernMay 17, 2018
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Ephesians

Music and Drunkenness, Part 1

Perhaps it is because I am a musician that I have always found Ephesians 5:18-19 so arbitrary. But isn’t it a little odd to contrast music and drunkenness? Perhaps it is not obvious that that is what Paul is doing; I know, for myself, that it is remarkably easy to…

by John AhernMay 15, 2018
infant-baptism
Baptism

Unequal Holiness

In 1 Corinthians 7:12-16 Paul deals with how the Corinthian Christians are supposed to be relating to unbelieving spouses. He essentially tells them, “Look, if your unbelieving spouse is willing to stay with you as a faithful Christian, don’t initiate a divorce. If he/she wants to leave you, let him/her…

by Bill SmithMay 10, 2018
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Violence

The Sword of Adam: Preterism vs. Pacifism, (Part 2)

For Part 1, click HERE . Those who focus on the supposed “pacifism” of Jesus and condemn the violence of God’s judgments throughout the Old Testament overlook the ministry of sacrificial bloodshed as an alternative to human bloodshed. The sword bearing of the sacrificial system was introduced to avoid the…

by Mike BullMay 8, 2018
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Violence

The Sword of Adam: Preterism vs. Pacifism, Part 1

How should a Christian respond to the objection that the Bible, like the Koran, is a book of violence and bloodshed? Numerous answers have been offered by well-meaning exegetes, but none of them gets to the heart of the matter: God desires to place a sword in the hands of…

by Mike BullMay 3, 2018
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Theopolis News

Alastair Roberts Appointed As Adjunct Senior Fellow

Beginning this summer, Dr. Alastair Roberts will join the Theopolis Institute as an adjunct Senior Fellow, the Institute has announced. Dr. Roberts will be a regular on the Theopolis podcast, teach intensive courses and in the Fellows Program, and help develop new programs and outlets. Roberts earned his PhD from…

by TheopolisMay 2, 2018

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Philosophy

Ree on Realism

Jonathan Ree has this to say to the Platonic realist who is afraid of attacks on realism: “you’re worried about being deprived of something that actually you haven’t got, and you wouldn’t know if you had . . . . it’s a chimera, this thing that they’re worried about having…

October 28, 2003
Philosophy

Derrida on Plato’s Dualism

Derrida explains Plato’s dualism as an effort to dominate writing (and, I suppose, reality) by the imposition of organizing contrasts and differences. Words are ambiguous; pharmakon means remedy or poison. Rather than leave this ambiguity lie, and simply follow out the proliferating differences that flow from it, Plato organizes and…

October 28, 2003
Philosophy

Derrida on Plato’s Dualism

Derrida explains Plato’s dualism as an effort to dominate writing (and, I suppose, reality) by the imposition of organizing contrasts and differences. Words are ambiguous; pharmakon means remedy or poison. Rather than leave this ambiguity lie, and simply follow out the proliferating differences that flow from it, Plato organizes and…

October 28, 2003
Theology

Natural Theology

Alan Jacobs reviews Stanley Hauerwas’s Against the Grain of the Universe in the current issue of Books & Culture , and Hauerwas talks about Barth’s insight that natural theology can never be “first” theology: “Barth discovered early in his career that the great error of 19th-century Protestant theology was its…

October 27, 2003

Exhortation, October 26

Exhortation for October 26: We pray every week that God’s kingdom would come. This is a very general prayer, that God would extend His righteous rule to the ends of the earth. But since we live everywhere, our prayer that God’s kingdom would come is a focused prayer that His…

October 26, 2003

Sacred Cows

We speak of “sacred cows,” and think that we are using a dead and meaningless metaphor. But the “sacred” of “sacred cow” is very real. Lay a finger on the sacred rights of the individual to do anything he likes with his genitals, tread on the sacred ground of individual…

October 25, 2003

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