Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
When I wrote my commentary on Ecclesiastes A Table in the Mist I took Eccl. 11:1-2 as a reference to the risk of international trade. It sure did seem to me like a reference to Solomon’s risky trade with other nations. Israel exported grain (bread) and Solomon’s ships returned to…
When we read an alphabetical psalm in English, we miss the fact that each verse begins with a new letter of the Hebrew alphabet. I have found one way to get around this, which is for the leader to announce something relevant about each letter before reading his half of…
How does the Lord’s Supper proclaim the death of Jesus until He comes? (1 Corinthians 11:26). Historically, liturgists have attempted to locate some act in the rite of the Supper that corresponds to the death of Jesus: the fraction (breaking of bread), or the fact that bread and wine are…
These notes are posted here by request. We all now live in the age of slob worship thanks to the “sixties.” I never experienced sitting for prayer until 20 years ago. Jesus was unhappy when His disciples could not watch and pray for one hour. Today’s slob Christians complain if…
On September 11, 2001, Jesus brought judgment upon the United States of America. Following His normal procedure, He used an even more evil force to do it (Habakkuk 1-3). The warning Jesus gives throughout the Bible to those He uses to punish others is that they need to repent, or…
Because of Donald Trump, the “Birther” issue is heating up. It is not going away, and is only part of a larger cluster of issues in regard to the President. Virtually all of the relevant documents concerning who he is and where he has been, have been suppressed, at great…
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I n the course of a discussion of the “harmony” of the economy of grace, the great English Puritan John Owen remarks on the incomprehensible universal harmony of creation ( Doctrine of Justification by Faith , 55) : There is a harmony, a suitableness of one thing unto another, in…
W e may think that Jane Austen has only recently entered pop culture consciousness. We'd be wrong. Devoney Looser's The Making of Jane Austen traces Austen's fortunes between 1833, when her novels were republished, and 1975, the bicentenary of her birth. Looser examines book illustrations, dramatizations of the plays, political…
A s the title suggests, Jonathan Pennington's The Sermon on the Mount and Human Flourishing sees the Sermon on the Mount as Jesus' instruction in a way of virtue and wisdom that leads to flourishing. As Pennington puts it, “Jesus provides in the Sermon a Christocentric, flourishing-oriented, kingdom-awaiting, eschatological wisdom…
I n The Sacredness of the Person , Hans Joas offers an “affirmative genealogy” of the notion of human rights. He traces the historical origins of the concept not, in Nietzchean fashion, to debunk, but to validate. Isolating the origins of a set of cultural values or practices need not,…
D avid Goldman argues that Trump sent “a clear message to America’s Muslim clients in Saudi Arabia: No more double games with non-state actors will be tolerated.” The double games have been going on a long time: “Saudi royal family members are funding every radical madrassa in Asia, including those…
I n Paul's letters, the verb “justify” (Gr. dikaioo ) means “acquit, judge favorably,” with overtones of forgiveness and reconciliation. It has an invariably positive meaning. Paul didn't learn to use “justify” that way from ancient or contemporary Greek. As James Prothro explains in a 2016 article, outside the Septuagint…
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