Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
John 18, 19: Latter Prophets and the Writings John 18 and 19 record the arrest, trial, torture, and death of Jesus as laid out in detail in Isaiah 53. After the Roman soldier pierces Jesus’ side, John quotes Zechariah: “They shall look at him whom they pierced” (Zech 12:10). In…
John 12.12 – John 17: Latter Prophets In the Hebrew Scriptures, Kings is followed by the Latter Prophets. John 12:15 quotes Zechariah 9:9 as having prophesied Jesus’ triumphal entry: “Do not be afraid, O Daughter of Zion; see, your king is coming, seated on a donkey’s colt.” [1] N.T. Wright…
John 6.16-70: Joshua The book of Joshua documents the nation of Israel entering the Promised Land. Consider the order of events: (1) Israel is still receiving the daily miracle of manna; (2) Israel miraculously crosses the Jordan on dry foot; (3) The day after Passover , Israel eats produce of…
Since my educational and professional training have revolved around story and narrative structure, I approach John’s Gospel from a literary and narrative perspective. In doing so, I have noticed structural story patterns and followed them where they seem to lead: the Gospel of John parallels the ordering of the books…
The Mt. Sinai Hospital was neolithic on the black hill of Hollow, New Hampshire. Winter dampened the trees and the wind bit at the sparse branches, the sidewalks and stairs were perilous with soggy leaves, and the dim yellow light cast a pallor upon the milky stone building. Ambling inside…
The Revelation can only be understood in the light of Old Testament symbols and sequences. The same is true of the epistle of Jude, which serves as a blistering hors d’oeuvre to John’s fiery feast. Possibly written by the apostle Judas Thaddaeus (Luke 6:16; Acts 1:13; John 14:22), the epistle…
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Greeks are adolescents; Achilles is an overgrown hyper-sensitive hyper-muscled teenager. A student points out that this applies also to humor: Greek humor is adolescent humor. Consider Aristophanes, the only extant Old Comedian. Case closed.
A Second Dream, 1 Kings 9:1-28 INTRODUCTION Solomon?s great building project was the house of Yahweh, which included the temple, the palace, and the government buildings (1 Kings 6-7). But Solomon also built a number of other buildings, fortresses and cities. 1 Kings 9 describes both Yahweh?s response to the…
Commenting on Deuteronomy 30:9ff in his new translation of the Pentateuch, Robert Alter offers the following comment on “Who will go up for us to the heavens, etc”: “The Deuteronomist, having given God’s teaching a local place and habitation in a text available to all, proceeds to reject the older…
A guest on Ken Myers’ Mars Hill audio magazine discusses the humor of The Ladykillers . What, he asks, are we laughing at when we see the plots of criminals return on their own heads? He suggests that we are laughing at the folly of humanity, and at the way…
Doug Jones suggests the following, promising Trinitarian account of the quadriga: Literal - Father (origins) Allegorical - Son (obvious enough) Anagogical - Spirit (completion) That of course leaves the tropological, but this has to do with the formation of the believer. In a Trinitarian perspective, the tropological points to the…
1 Kings 8:2 Like the Christian calendar, Israel?s festival calendar did not cover the whole of the year. It began with Passover in the first month of the liturgical year, went through Pentecost in the third month, and climaxed with a series of feasts in the seventh month: the feast…
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