Theopolis Logo

Writing

Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.

See all
screen-shot-2020-07-28-at-7-12-05-am
John

A Conversation at the Sheep Pool (John 5)

One evening at dusk two men met under a portico near the North wall in Jerusalem. They greeted one another cordially and sat down on a stone bench. They were both Pharisees. One of the men appeared to be uncomfortable and kept looking around nervously. The other said, “Don’t worry,…

by Jeff MeyersJuly 28, 2020
screen-shot-2020-07-21-at-10-29-59-am
Christology

Real Union or Legal Fiction? | Nevin’s Controversy With Charles Hodge Over the Imputation of Adam’s Sin

John Williamson Nevin’s Controversy With Charles Hodge Over the Imputation of Adam’s Sin (with a Comparison to Robert L. Dabney) If one is blessed to discover George P. Hutchinsons’s monograph on Original Sin in nineteenth-century Reformed thought, 1 no student of American presbyterianism can fail to be fascinated. What once…

by Mark HorneJuly 21, 2020
thijs-van-diessen-ihhert2uh5y-unsplash-2
Biblical Theology

Fire on the Mountain

If you stop people on the street and ask them, “Where is God?” you’ll get a range of responses from a vague sense that He’s “up there somewhere” to a generic omnipresence (and it goes downhill from there!) What God does in Acts 2 challenges us to develop and apply…

by Tim NicholsJuly 14, 2020
jonah
Matthew

The Sign of Jonah

Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered him, saying, “Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you.” But he answered them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For just as…

by Ken HicksJuly 7, 2020
tanner-mardis-xuxghzhibn4-unsplash-2
Genesis

Lost Worlds?

John Walton believes that modern Christians have lost multiple worlds: The Lost World of Genesis One; The Lost World of Adam and Eve; The Lost World of Scripture; The Lost World of the Israelite Conquest; The Lost World of the Flood; The Lost World of the Torah. I believe this…

by Ralph Allan SmithJuly 2, 2020
stephanie-leblanc-z4lxu7niii4-unsplash
Interview

N.T. Wright on How the Church Should Respond to the Pandemic

How should the church respond to the pandemic? N.T. Wright has written a book which searches the depths of Scripture to answer this question. Our challenge is that we do not yet understand the pandemic, at least not with any degree of consensus. We don't know whose fault it is,…

by Jerry Bowyer & N.T. WrightJune 30, 2020

Showing page 65 of 309

See all
See all

Typical Beauty

Ruskin's concept of "typical beauty" is a piece of theological aesthetics. In the second volume of Modern Painters , Ruskin distinguished kinds of beauty, the typical and the vital. Of the first, he says: "that external quality of bodies already so often spoken of, and which, whether it occur in…

July 26, 2018

Of Subject and Objects

In the third volume of Modern Painters , Ruskin addresses the "German dulness, and English affectation" that has "multiplied among us the use of two of the most objectionable words that were ever coined by the troublesomeness of metaphysicians,—namely, 'Objective,' and 'Subjective.'" The words are "exquisitely . . . useless"…

July 25, 2018

Hopkins and Typology

George Landow argues ( Victorian Types, Victorian Shadows ) that the poetry of Gerald Manley Hopkins would look less bizarre, though no less innovative, if we placed Hopkins more firmly in the poetics of his time. Which is to say, placed him in the context of a typological poetics. Hopkins's…

July 24, 2018

Architecture of Sacrifice

Architecture, Ruskin claims ( Seven Lamps of Architecture ), isn’t the same as building. Architecture refers to the specifically artistic features of a building, and the specifically artistic features have to do with adornment and not function: “Architecture concerns itself only with those characters of an edifice which are above…

July 23, 2018

Types of Color

John Ruskin was the main art critic of his time; he was an artists himself, and also wrote on a variety of other topics, especially on the state of English politics and economy. He abandoned explicit attachment to Evangelical Christianity but remained deeply indebted. He provides an excellent example of…

July 19, 2018

The Typological Imagination

Typological forms of thought weren't confined to sermons and commentaries, but made their way into 19 th -century English poetry. -Some poets put typology to orthodox uses, though here we can see divergent deployments of a similar typology. Elizabeth Barrett Browning wrote a poem, Casa Guidi Windows (1851) about the…

July 18, 2018

Showing page 64 of 2212

Browse by Category

In Medias Res

Your weekly digest for all things Theopolis.

Donate

Theopolis is nearly 100% donor-supported. Consider joining us on our mission.