Theopolis Logo

Writing

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

See all
sixteen-miles-out-al48tflf4e8-unsplash
Food

Gluttony In The Bible (As Opposed To Gluttony In The American Church)

In the Bible, fatness is such a blessing, that it is especially hard to understand why wicked men are permitted to enjoy such a state. It requires a theodicy and faith in God. Thus: “For they have no pangs until death; their bodies are fat and sleek . They are…

by Mark HorneAugust 12, 2013
jeremy-yap-j39x2xx_8cq-unsplash
How to Worship

Biblical Worship (Video with James B. Jordan)

[fve]http://vimeo.com/71901553[/fve]

by Peter LeithartAugust 8, 2013
chris-bair-ndczc5739ck-unsplash
Deuteronomy

Holy Things for Holy People

The allusion to the Exodus story is contained in the first words of Deuteronomy 14:1 — “ye are the sons of Yahweh your God” — as well as in 14:2 in the use of the technical term translated “treasured possession,” “His own possession,” “peculiar people,” “precious people,” and so forth.…

by Ralph Allan SmithAugust 5, 2013
adam-and-eve-in-the-garden-of-eden-wenzel-peter
Deuteronomy

Forbidden Foods

I have argued that Deuteronomy 14:1-21 is an independent literary unit that applies the Third Word to the lives of Israelites from the time of Moses and Joshua. In this short pericope, Moses suggests broad and deep meaning by means of literary allusion to the stories of the creation and…

by Ralph Allan SmithJuly 31, 2013
david-weber-fwuo_zluhnw-unsplash
How to Worship

Pro-Sacramental Reformation

In his recently republished The New Creation , the late, delightful Herbert McCabe defends the priesthood of the plebs as roundly as anyone could want. Citing Hebrews, he claims that "there is an essential difference between the Christian community and the community of the Old Law, or any other religious…

by Peter LeithartJuly 29, 2013
eric-ward-7kqe_8meex8-unsplash
Augustine

Sexual Idolatry

Augustine famously prayed, “Our hearts our restless until they rest in You.” True indeed. Being creatures, we inherently sense our ontological poverty—our innate condition of dependence—and are compelled to find a sense of security. And it is also true—as Augustine’s own narrative painfully illustrates—that one of the things we most…

by Gerald HiestandJuly 24, 2013

Showing page 190 of 309

See all

Showing page 7 of 43

See all
Literature

Humane literature

A TLS reviewer of Will Self’s recent Liver compares Self’s work with that of the late David Foster Wallace: “He shared with Self a willingness to experiment with genre, pastische and several other acutely artificial literary devices, as well as a sense of the grotesque, a liking for long words…

January 17, 2009
Philosophy

Zizek

With his rock star style and his intoxicating brew of high and pop culture, Zizek seems to be a paradigmatic pomo. Not so, says Terry Eagleton: “If he steals some of the postmodernists’ clothes, he has little but contempt for their multiculturalism, anti-universalism, theoretical dandyism and modist obsession with culture.…

January 17, 2009

Russian Orthodoxy

In a largely negative review of John and Carol Garrard’s Russian Orthodoxy Resurgent ( TNR , December 31), Leon Aron notes the importance of Orthodoxy in contemporary Russian politics: “Orthodoxy is now all the rage among the Russian elite. The formerly godless KGB and Komsomol graduates who rule the country…

January 17, 2009

First and Last

Since the patristic period, the parable of the laborers in the vineyard (Matthew 20:1-16) has been detached from its context and understood as a parable about Jews and Gentiles (Irenaeus) or about early and late conversion (Origen). Those are, I think, valid uses or applications of the parable, but the…

January 17, 2009

Gnostic and Jesus’ Humanity

Several times in her Sacred Power, Sacred Space (Oxford), Jeanne Halgren Kilde makes odd comments about the gnostic emphasis on Jesus’ humanity. Like this: “Although Gnostics had struggled mightily to emphasize Jesus’ humanity, the concept of the holy Trinity, and with it the divinity of Christ, became orthodox. Yet the…

January 16, 2009
Uncategorized

Useful idiots?

Now here’s a wonder. In his recent The Contested Public Square (IVP), Greg Forster says that in the early centuries the church developed “a thoroughly - and irreversibly - apolitical understanding of its own existence and mission.” Irreversible, that is, until it was reversed. Less that forty pages later, Forster…

January 15, 2009

Showing page 1427 of 2212

Browse by Category

In Medias Res

Your weekly digest for all things Theopolis.

Donate

Theopolis is nearly 100% donor-supported. Consider joining us on our mission.