Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
We've all heard it, too often to count. The Apostle Paul was a misgynistic homophobic pro-slavery authoritarian, probably a repressed homosexual himself, the first Puritan - Puritan here defined as "someone who cannot sleep if someone in the world is having fun." To call this a caricature is too generous.…
Some of our forefathers believed in reading/singing the psalms in order. Today, when the psalms are even used at all, they tend to be used randomly, though sometimes tied to a church calendar or to the pastor’s sermon. The Bible does not bind us to any particular practice, but there…
". . . and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they were drinking from a spiritual rock that followed them; and the rock was Christ" (1 Corinthians 10:4). Paul’s passing comment about the rock that followed the Israelites in the wilderness has often been treated as a bit of…
The story of Hezekiah’s illness and recovery is familiar to every child who has attended Sunday School. Informed that he would die, faithful King Hezekiah pleaded in tears for a longer life. God heard his prayers and saw his tears, and promised fifteen more years. As a sign that He…
When viewed as an allegory of biblical history, the controversial third act of Danny Boyle’s gripping sci-fi adventure is transformed from an illogical divergence into a blinding revelation. The following analysis contains spoilers for the movie “Sunshine.” The Creation Week is the elementary type that orders everything God has said…
In my last post , I told you the story of my current desire to understand philosopher D.C. Schindler’s metaphysical work. With this post, I start in to the venture. I begin by reflecting on what it is to be a thing. This matter always makes me laugh, and makes…
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Pickstock offers a theological alternative to Derrida’s concern that giving is impossible since any hope of a return robs the gift of its character as gift and puts it instead into the category of mutually advantageous capitalist exchange. Pickstock points out that in renouncing “the return” as “an ethical category,”…
Pickstock uses the “list” as a crucial example of the dominance of asyndeton of modern discourse. Lists provide “a powerful organization of random phenomena,” but at the same time the order slips into chaos because there is nothing linking the “unrelated elements” of the list. They are merely juxtaposed spatially,…
Pickstock again: For Derrida, there is ultimately no real difference, since all difference is univocally violent. There are particular differences of this and that, but they are all different in the same way - violently different - so there is a “transcendent” sameness. Derrida’s absolute difference collapses is really penultimate…
Pickstock again: For Derrida, there is ultimately no real difference, since all difference is univocally violent. There are particular differences of this and that, but they are all different in the same way - violently different - so there is a “transcendent” sameness. Derrida’s absolute difference collapses is really penultimate…
Catherine Pickstock argues that Socrates does not articulate a “metaphysical” view of self-presence or interiority. She focuses on the erotic character of knowledge in the Phaedrus, which she points out, radically undermines the interior/exterior boundary. Knowledge on this view always involves ecstasy, an attraction to an object outside, and the…
2 Kings 16 is organized chiastically: 1. Formulaic introduction, 16:1-4 2. Threat to Jerusalem, and bribe of Tiglath-pileser, 16:5-9 3. State visit to Damascus, 16:10-11 (altar) 4. Ahaz ministers at the altar, 16:12-14 3’. Continuing worship at the altar, 16:15-16 2’. Tribute to Tiglath-pileser and plunder of temple, 16:17-18 1’.…
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