Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
What do you think of the way "creation science" uses the "second law of thermodynamics" to argue that human society will become more and more depraved, and that the universe is running down? Creation Science is not monolithic, and so it would be unfair to say that everyone working in…
From time to time we receive questions that are interesting, and that other people would also be interested in. I'll [address] two such questions in this issue [and the next]. I recently made a will which, in the event that my wife does not survive me, grants my eldest son…
As we go from Old Testament chronology to New Testament chronology, it will be a good idea to examine a deep-seated myth that is profoundly intertwined with Biblical Christianity. I have in mind the myth that there is in the Bible such a thing as a collection of books called…
Several years ago, the Wall Street Journal gave prominent recognition to a book called Who Wrote the Bible? The book was a popularization of the famous "Documentary Hypothesis," which claims that the Pentateuch was not the work of Moses, but was a (rather incompetent) pastiche of contradictory sources written much…
The epistle of James has long presented dificulties for New Testament scholars. Its seemingly moralistic tone, its apparent inattention to theological concerns, its defense of "justification by works" all have made it dificult for interpreters to discern its compatibility with other New Testament books. Luther’s dismissal of James as an…
Why the Lamb? But why the lamb? We have seen that the bull was the offering for the sins of priests, especially as they represented the nation before God in His house. Wasn’t Christ the greatest of all men? Wasn’t He the Great High Priest? Should He not rather be…
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One day, Henry just quit. He had soldered wires for he didn’t know what in the back room of the Magnavox plant for thirteen years, and enough was enough. His eyes itched, the watery coffee from the machine was bitter, the pinups in the maintenance room never changed, and he…
INTRODUCTION When Christians speak of the “holy family,” they normally have in mind Jesus’ “nuclear family,” Joseph and Mary and his siblings. But Matthew begins with Jesus’ larger family, tracing his descent from Abraham and David. THE TEXT “The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the Son of David,…
Jonathan McIntosh, a student at the University of Dallas, challenges Vanhoozer’s (and Radical Orthodoxy’s) reading of Scotus that I summarized in a previous post, arguing that Scotus does not deny analogy. He has a point. The following discussion of Scotus’ understanding of the univocity of being is taken largely from…
Ian Robinson’s The Establishment of Modern English Prose in the Reformation and the Enlightenment (Cambridge, 1998) is a fascinating discussion of the history of the sentence and of English punctuation, and, despite its heavy-handed title, is a delight to read. Does the sentence have a history? Robinson shows that it…
Kevin Vanhoozer has done a great service by editing the Cambridge Companion to Postmodern Theology (2003). Though the authors of the various articles differ among themselves, they are all well-informed about postmodern thought and culture and are making an effort to respond from the stance of Christian theology. In his…
In the Summa theologiae (1.1.9), Thomas argues that “it is more fitting that divine matters should be conveyed under the figure of lowly bodies than of noble bodies.” Rocks are better figures for God than ideal forms. Thomas gives three reasons for this preference: First, if “lowly” bodies provide the…
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