Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Why there is more to Jephthah than meets than eye It was not that long ago that I realized the Jephthah-story and the Jesus-story were basically the same story. Sounds crazy, I know. But here is a one-paragraph synopsis of both: The people of God have gone their own way,…
G.K. Chesterton famously said that the Gospels don’t reveal Jesus’ mirth. It’s true we never catch Jesus laughing. But can we believe He never did? I don’t think so. Laughter is human, and Jesus was fully human. Jesus promised that those who mourned would laugh. He mourned; would He not…
Matthew 2 has all the elements of an exodus story. There’s a murderous king, who slaughters Jewish babies. There’s a infant who will be Israel’s future deliverer, saved from the murderous king so He can later return to save His people and lead them to the Promised land. There’s an…
The calendar of Israel was primarily theological, centered on commemorating the salvific acts of God, but also agricultural, celebrating the creation-restoring effects of those salvific acts. The feasts of the first month celebrated the reviving of the world in the Spring, and typified the cutting off of the Savior in…
The chiastic shape corresponds to the shape of human life. This should not surprise us, because we are made in the image of God, and God is manifest in Word and Spirit. If we are living epistles, our lives will look a bit like the literary shape of the books…
Back in January, Venkatesh Rao wrote a fascinating post on the Ribbonfarm blog, discussing different forms of models of narrative. Engaging with Ursula LeGuin’s talk ‘The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction’ , Rao explores her contrast between the (male) ‘hero narrative’ and the (female) ‘carrier-bag story’, and suggests a third…
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T he literary world is atwitter this week with the revelation of the real identity of Elena Ferrante, the pseudonym used by the author of the acclaimed Neopolitan Quartet. Italian journalist Claudio Gatti reported on his months-long investigation in the New York Review . Gatti’s conclusion, based on real estate…
J ohn Milbank and Adrian Pabst ( Politics of Virtue , 17) claim that “politics should revert to its ancient character as a ‘politics of the soul,’ concerned above all to nurture virtuous citizens, just as parents are concerned above all with the character of their children, precisely because they…
J ohn Milbank and Adrian Pabst ( Politics of Virtue , 47) observe that the liberal state claims to release “the economic and social spheres to be pre-politically themselves as natural, meaning true to human biological needs and inclinations.” In fact, however, it “politically produces this sphere of man as…
S carcity is one of the central premises of economic theory. John Milbank and Adrian Pabst see the premise of scarcity as one of a triad of pessimistic assumptions that found liberal order - the other two are “ontological violence and natural egoism” ( Politics of Virtue , 48). They…
M atthew Crawford ( The World Beyond Your Head ) observes that we can do simple mathematics in our heads. We can even multiply bigger numbers by breaking them down into smaller ones. At some point, though, most of us lost track: “If one has to multiply 356 by 911,…
1 Chronicles 17 is the Chronicler’s account of the Davidic covenant, Yahweh’s commitment to the Davidic dynasty. In his response to the Lord’s pledge, David summarizes the aims of the exodus (v. 21). Following the Hebrew word order, we can see a somewhat irregular chiasm: A. And what one nation…
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