Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
The drink offering or libation ( nesek ) is mentioned in only three places in the book of Leviticus. When the sheaf of the firstfruits was waved before the Lord, a grain offering was to be burned, along with "its libation, a fourth of a hin of wine [approx. one…
When I became a Calvinist it wasn't long before I learned that John Owen’s The Death of Death in the Death of Christ was regarded as the masterful treatise on what is known as "Limited Atonement"--the "L" in the TULIP mnemonic device for "the five points of Calvinism." This wasn't…
One of the advantages of paying very close attention to the details in the Bible, especially chronological and genealogical details, is that they can shed light on situations that don’t seem to make much sense apart from them. One such situation is that of Bathsheba. It appears that Bathsheba willingly…
The Feast of Ingathering in the seventh month of the Sinaitic calendar is also called the Feast of Sukkoth, of Booths, also called Feast of Tabernacles. I have usually called it by that last phrase, and it is the most common today; but there is a problem: A tabernacle is…
When Matthew’s Gospel was first read aloud to the fledgling Christian congregations, the experience must have been like seeing the words “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…” appear afresh on cinema screens in 1999. Yet, unlike The Phantom Menace, the New Testament did not disappoint. Why?…
Fragmentation and integration are phenomena which artist Makoto Fujimura feels bodily, and about which he is concerned profoundly. What do these mean for him? How may we draw his insights into this ongoing consideration—itself integrative—of integration in a fragmented world? Thus far I have been acquainting you with matters already…
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“T he whole of religion is contained in the Sacraments,” Feuerbach says at the beginning of The Essence of Christianity . That is, “there are . . . no other religious acts than those which are performed in Baptism and the Lord's Supper.” This being so, Feuerbach claims that “the…
Laurent Fleury's Sociology of Culture and Cultural Practices is “underpinned” by a conviction that runs counter to the consensus of sociology, especially among those influenced by Pierre Bourdieu. Fleury's conviction is that “there are no simple, univocal links between attitudes developed in childhood and choices, preferences, and practices deployed in…
MD Goulder ( Type and History in Acts ) summarizes the complaints against Luke's history of the early church in Acts: “No student can read Acts without dissatisfaction: he would not have written it thus. Why does it end where it ends? Why is so much space devoted to the…
Nietzche ( AntiChrist ) claims that German philosophy is descended from German theology. Kant's victory is a theological one. Nietzsche's own position, though, is equally theological, a different one. But not that different, because like Kant he's a low church Protestant attacking decadent priestly religion. The priest (section 26) is…
John hears several voices as he sees new Jerusalem descend from heaven like a bride. He hears a loud voice “out of the throne” announcing, in third person, that God has pitched His tent among men (Revelation 21:3-4). Then the one seated on the throne speaks: “Behold new I make…
Francis's I's pastoral exhortation on family life, A moris laetitia , will inevitably, and rightly, be the subject of scrutiny by Catholic theologians and canon lawyers. A great deal is at stake. But it's also important to note, as even hostile commentators have, that the controversial passages are set within…
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