Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
The first commandment given in the Levitical sacrificial legislation has to do with the animals appropriate to sacrifice: "When any man of you brings an offering to the Lord, you shall bring your offering of cattle ( behemah ), from the herd or the flock" (Lev. 1:2). Cattle alone were…
This post was originally posted in 2004 The ultimate condemnation of a position in Reformed circles is to show that it “leads back to Rome.” Indeed, one gets the feeling that Rome is a worse destination for a Presbyterian than even hell itself. The accusation of Rome stings deeply, of…
There are countless scholars who have helped me in my reading of various passages of Scripture. I have gleaned insights and keys from them that have unlocked texts that once perplexed me. However, no scholar has done so much to teach me how to read the Scripture more generally than…
The Tortoise and the Hare is perhaps the most well-known of the Greek fables. Its story has been present in every era of human history. From the Indigenous retellings with hummingbirds and cranes to the Biblical account of David and Goliath, the basic furniture of an unlikely hero tale is…
Sexual sins are perhaps the most shame-inducing sins experienced by Christians and non-Christians alike. All sins can bring shame, but sexual sins are deeply personal and affect us in profound ways. For example, adultery leaves its victim devastated by betrayal; porn addiction leaves men feeling gross, pathetic, and lazy; losing…
If the mark of a good book is how many times a person can re-read it with pleasure, Richard Adams’ novel Watership Down is one of the best books of the 20 th century. I’ve taught this book in my middle school literature class for the past three years, and…
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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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