Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
And through the hands of the apostles many signs and wonders were done among the people. And they were all with one accord in Solomon's Porch. Yet none of the rest dared join them, but the people esteemed them highly. Acts 5:12-13 When Grandma needed healing, her children knew the…
Like certain kinds of music, the unchanging rhythm of Aquinas's Summa gets into your bones. Read a few sections and it begins to run through your head. You start drumming your fingers, humming, swaying gently to the rhythm of Videtur-Sed Contra-Responsio, Videtur-Sed Contra-Responsio, “It seems-On the contrary-I answer.” The only…
And Arpachshad lived thirty-five years, and became the father of Shelah . . . And Shelah lived thirty years, and became the father of Eber . . . and Eber lived thirty-four years and became the father of Peleg . . . and Peleg lived thirty years, and became the…
Of course, the title should be something like, “The Fall of the Angel Who Came to be Satan,” but that and other more accurate titles are too cumbersome. The question is: who is Satan, and when and how did he become “Satan” (Adversary, Accuser) and the “devil” (slanderer)? By my…
In The Oddness of the Feast of Booths , we saw that the Feast of Booths is a commemoration of the first encampment of Israel at Sukkoth (Booths) in Exodus 12:37, almost certainly the first celebration of the week of Unleavened Bread after the first Passover. The Feast of Booths…
This piece was originally published in 1989. 1. The Blessed Hope "Looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus." Titus 2:13 I was recently asked how I as a postmillennialist would preach on "The Blessed Hope." This is often…
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T he genealogies of Chronicles begin with “Adam,” and the ancestors of the Chronicler's people Israel appear only after a half-chapter of names. Yet the Chronicler, like other Old Testament writers, considers Israel the “firstborn” nation (Exod. 4:23). As Scott Hahn puts it ( The Kingdom of God as Liturgical…
J esus can be an embarrassment, not least to disciples. Peter Brown points to an example in his recent The Ransom of the Soul , Jesus's statement to the rich young ruler to “go and sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in…
I n his stimulating meditation on The Dominion of the Dead , Robert Pogue Harrison observes, following Fustel de Coulanges, that “the ancient house and in its turn the ancient city, were founded upon such sepulchers” (26). Even empires are so founded. Witness The Aeneid : “After the destruction of…
W hatever happened to post-structuralism? asks Terry Eagleton in the TLS . Born in the latter part of the 1960s in reaction to the structural linguistics of Saussure and the structural anthropology of Levi-Strauss, post-structuralism presented itself as a liberation movement: “Structures were to be unmasked as less stable than…
Y ahweh promised Abraham a land and a seed to plant in it. He planted a vineyard and it filled the land. Then He drive them from the land, scattered them out among the Gentiles. “Cast your bread on the water,” Solomon says. “For you will find it after many…
1 Chronicles 9:1 sounds like closure. Israel's genealogies are enrolled, and the Chronicler cites the source of his information, the book of the Kings of Israel. Judah is off in Babylonian exile because of her unfaithfulness. Yet the text moves on, and the genealogy isn't yet done. After the end,…
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