Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
When might the Gospel according to Matthew have been written? Of course, any answer can only be speculation, but that does not mean we are reduced to groundless opinion. In this series of articles I point the way to an approach different from the general consensus among scholars today which…
In my first essay on “synopticity” I offered a rather rough definition of the phenomenon and important, though not exhaustive examples. In this essay, I want to introduce broader aspects of the phenomenon of “synopticity.” The first example that I have in mind is conventional stories, stories of different historical…
Since the judgment of Babel was followed by the initiation of the circumcision, the impending end of the circumcision in AD70 explains the significance of the first century miracle of foreign tongues. Except for a few Aramaic “teasers” in the book of Daniel, the Word of God was monolingual and…
To the best of my knowledge “synopticity” is not a word used in theology or Biblical studies, but it seems an appropriate word to describe the kind of phenomena associated with the Synoptic Gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke. These three Gospels tell essentially the same story with significant — sometimes…
Humor is a funny thing. It is altogether familiar yet also mysterious. What makes us laugh? Why do we find things funny? There are academic fields of study dedicated to discovering what makes things humorous. These academicians even have a journal entitled International Journal of Humor Research . No joke.…
Out of all the characters in Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales , the Pardoner has been called the “one lost soul.” The pious Parson, who closes out the collection of tales with a sermon on the seven deadly sins and how a sinner can absolve himself of them, connects the…
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Between Revelation 6:16-17, which speak of the “wrath of the Lamb” and “the great day of their wrath,” and 11:18, which says that the wrath came against the enraged nations, there is no reference to the wrath ( orge ) of God. As the seals come to a conclusion, the…
“Dominion” has a bad rap these days. The creation mandate to “have dominion, fill, subdue, and rule” the earth is regarded with suspicion: It gives human beings religious justification for environmental rapacity, domination of the other, sexism and racism. The Bible recognizes this possibility. The first king in Scripture is…
Over the centuries, readers have assumed that Revelation was written in, or predicting, a period of intense persecution. Irenaeus seems to say that Revelation was written in the reign of Domitian, and commentators have gone to lengths to show that Domitian fits the profile of the beast. Scholars today widely…
Scientists are human. They need to communicate with each other. For centuries, science has been an international, now a global, enterprise. How do scientists communicate? Once, French was, well, the lingua franca , so dominant in the discourses of high culture and science of the late 18th century that even…
The action of Revelation 12-15 moves from the sky to earth to the sea and then back up. In 11:19, the temple of God in heaven is opened, revealing the heavenly ark. Then there is a sign in heaven, in the firmament where the sun, moon, and stars are, the…
Apocalypse is also supposed to describe a particular form of eschatology, particularly beliefs about the end of the world. This is the sense in which the word is used in Ernst Kasemann’s famous claim that apocalyptic is the mother of Christian theology. Kasemann meant that early Christians believed in the…
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