Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Summary In what follows, I will consider the “year-stamps” employed in Scripture, i.e., statements of the form, “Such-and-such an event took place in the Xth year of Y.” In the process, I will suggest some ways in which the Biblical narrative might relate to events in the extra-Biblical world, though…
In the first essay on the parable of the Prodigal Son, I suggested that the problems commentators and others encounter in interpreting Jesus three-part parable are not accidental. These are not just problems in our ignorance of cultural background. They are intentional features of the stories —stories designed to poke…
The story of the Prodigal Son is perhaps the most well-known story in the Bible. As others have observed, it may also be one of the most misunderstood. In two short essays, I will point out features of this story that are commonly neglected, aspects of Jesus’ parable that might…
The parable of Lazarus and the nameless rich man is not an independent story. It is part of a long context that begins in Luke 15:1, where Jesus is eating with tax collectors and sinners and the scribes and Pharisees grumble. In response to their hardheartedness, Jesus tells a three-part…
The Bible is written so that even when a reader cannot pick up on what might be deeper or more detailed aspects of a text, there is virtually always a message to be heard. In the ancient world, where the “reader” of Scripture would likely be a church official facing…
The distinction between garden (or vineyard) and field begins in Genesis 2. This relates to the ordering of the formless world. Plants of the field are contrasted with the garden planted by God in Genesis 2:5&8. Later on, under the Old Covenant the Israelites will be required to keep their…
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In a December 2012 article in Charisma Magazine , Audrey Lee reports on the Christian revival taking place among Muslims in Iraq and Iran: “Mission researchers estimate more Muslims have committed to follow Christ in the last 10 years than in the last 15 centuries of Islam. Yet Islamic governments…
Though Kurt Stasiak is a Roman Catholic and a Benedictine, much of what he writes in Sacramental Theology: Means of Grace, Way of Life (Catholic Basics: A Pastoral Ministry Series) is catholic in another sense. He points out (18) that sacraments are not a “sacred parenthesis,” a slice of holy,…
In their history of zoos ( Zoo: A History of Zoological Gardens in the West ), Eric Baratay and Elisabeth Hardouin-Fugier note a connection between Crusades and the development of European zoos. Romans maintained seraglios for the animals used in combats, and these were continued in Byzantium until the twelfth…
Some nuggets from Thomas. The first from his commentary on the Sentences (XLIV, 1, 2): “They reason falsely [who say that] since an angel is better than a stone, therefore two angels are better than one angel and a stone . . . . Although an angel, considered absolutely is…
It’s odd to describe a book with a title like Life, the Universe, and Everything: An Aristotelian Philosophy for a Scientific Age as “delightful” and “charming,” but that’s what Ric Machuga’s book is. Besides “clear,” “rigorous” and “illuminating.” Some samples from a discussion of God’s omnipotence (pp. 256-7): “Suppose an…
In his Christianity and History (94), Herbert Butterfield gives this wonderful musical analogy of history: “We might say that this human story is like a piece of orchestra music that we are playing over for the first time. In our presumption we may act as though we were the composer…
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