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

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Art

The Second Word V: On Images and Art, Part 3

The Failure of the Church Yet a third factor played an important role in this historical development, in addition to the imperial adoption of icons and the rise of the icons of the holy man. Brown writes: "The great Christian basilicas of the previous centuries tended to stand empty, except…

by James B. JordanSeptember 4, 1998
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Biblical Horizons

Patriarchal Dominion

The three large patriarchal narratives of Genesis concern the three aspects of the cosmos: matter, space, and time. Over these three is man given dominion. Lucifer was originally appointed to train man in this dominion, but he chose to lead man into rebellion instead. Thus, the Angel of Yahweh replaced…

by James B. JordanAugust 4, 1998
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Biblical Horizons

The Case Against Western Civilization, Part 6

Part 6: Living in a Dying World (continued) The "Trivium" (continued) The five stages of education are simply the five stages of the covenant as God administers it in human life and history, and in the liturgy of covenant renewal: First, God announces Himself. "I am Yahweh Your God." He…

by James B. JordanAugust 4, 1998
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Biblical Studies

Re-creation in the Ascension Offering

The following essay is tentative and exploratory, offered for your consideration. It seems to me that the ritual of the Ascension Offering (incorrectly translated as Burnt Offering) of Leviticus 1 is a symbolic recapitulation of Genesis 1, which thereby portrays the sacrificial ritual as way of moving from a fallen…

by James B. JordanJuly 4, 1998
Biblical Horizons

The Framework Hypothesis: A Gnostic Heresy

Just as the vast majority of evangelical Christians in America today are Arminian and Baptist, so the vast majority do not believe in a creation around 4000 BC. I don’t expect any of these three situations to change anytime soon. Powerful presuppositions are at work in all three instances, along…

by James B. JordanJuly 4, 1998
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Art

The Second Word V: On Images and Art, Part 2

The Iconoclastic Controversy Continuing Pagan Influence How did images creep in? To begin with, there was in the post-Constantinian Church a concerted effort on the part of the semi-pagans to interpret Christianity in essentially pantheistic terms. The heretics put God and man on a continuum of "being," so that God…

by James B. JordanJuly 4, 1998

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Acts

Peter's Exodus

The entire Bible is a book of exodus. The Gospel is the good news of exodus, the announcement that the God of exodus has entered our broken world to lead His children from the tomb to His table. The God of exodus comes to lead creation itself into the glorious…

December 19, 2022
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American PoliticsNational Conservatism

Dualism Is the Problem

A few additional reflections on National Conservatism and Christian Nationalism. My recurring, obsessive theme is: The dualism isn’t the solution; it’s the problem . First: In his contribution to the Theopolis Conversation on National Conservatism, William Wolfe writes , “NatCon is not trying to ‘save a nation’ in a spiritual…

December 5, 2022
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NationalismTheopolis News

In Defense of Alastair Roberts

Over the past week, Theopolis Senior Fellow Alastair Roberts has been embroiled in an intense online controversy. Alastair identified Thomas Achord as the author of racist tweets on a Twitter account that used the pseudonym “Tulius Aadland.” Until the controversy broke out, Achord was headmaster of a classical Christian school…

November 29, 2022
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American PoliticsChristian Nationalism

Christian Nationalism

Two recent books on Christian nationalism became surprise Amazon bestsellers: Christian Nationalism by Gab founder Andrew Torba and pastor Andrew Isker, and The Case for Christian Nationalism by Stephen Wolfe. The first is a brief biblical defense of Christian nationalism; the latter is a quasi-Thomistic, two-kingdoms argument for Christian nationalism.…

November 28, 2022
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Nationalism

Nations: Grown or Imagined?

Romantic thinkers like Johann Gottfried Herder, developed an organic conception of nationhood. For Herder, a nation is an extended family, and so a perfect nation, the most natural state, is “one nation, an extended family with one national character." (I rely on this essay by Richard White.) People have a…

November 25, 2022
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Ecclesiology

Do We Need the Church?

A few weeks ago, I gave an online talk for the Colson Center. These were my opening comments. Let me begin by playing a game theologians often play, the game of challenging the question. The title of this series is, “The Essential Church: Why Christians (and the World) Still Need…

November 21, 2022

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