Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
And the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us, and we beheld His glory...(John 1:14) Commentaries on John, discussing the Word or Logos in John 1, routinely turn to Greek philosophy and say that John is using a term and at least part of an idea familiar in the ancient…
Jeremiah Burroughs defines contentment as “that sweet, inward, quiet, gracious frame of spirit, which freely submits to and delights in God’s wise and fatherly disposal in every condition” Contentment is one Christian virtue that Americans have an incredibly hard time understanding and applying. We have such comfortable lives that we…
"The goal I have for myself, my family, and my church is total bible saturation. I expected the Exodus Intensive class to help me with that, but I am shocked just how much it did," said Mark Balthrop, a pastor in Oklahoma City who attended Theopolis' recent course on the…
In a characteristically pithy essay, Robert Jenson has decried the “two paired errors” of traditional atonement theory. On the one hand, the cross is separated “from its future, in the resurrection” and, on the other, from “its past in the canonical history of Israel.” For the apostles, crucifixion is “anything…
The Historical-Grammatical Nanny State Typological interpretation is either abused or frowned upon, a domain relegated to mystics and charlatans, where the angels of modern academia fear to tread. But what if the Bible itself contained safeguards against irresponsible flights of fancy? And if it did, what would they look like?…
It is harsh advice for a suffering soul to be told to be content, to be happy, to be delighting in the rough circumstances. Is Christian contentment something we should automatically have as a result of being in Christ? Is it something we do? Is it an action or is…
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Intertextuality is a buzz word in contemporary biblical scholarship. In New Testament studies, the impetus has come not only from literary critical approaches but from the “New Perspective on Paul,” whose main advocate, EP Sanders, encouraged the study of Pauline echoes and allusions to the Hebrew Scriptures and contemporary Jewish…
Shlomo Sand argues in How I Stopped Being A Jew that “he foundations on which the State of Israel was created were essentially laid by socialists from the various Eastern European nations. These individuals were secularists who rebelled against Judaism, yet they were forced none the less to adopt from…
In a 2001 article in History of Religious , Guy Stroumsa hightlights the role of John Spencer’s De legibus hebraeorum ritualibus (1685), sometime master of Corpus Christi, Cambridge, in the development of evolutionary and scientific studies of religion. Spencer, in turn, drew heavily on Jewish sources. Stroumsa writes, “Spencer was…
Yahweh promises Abram a son, but he grows old. He knows that his son will come from his own flesh (Genesis 15) but he doesn’t yet know that Sarai will be the mother (cf. Genesis 17). Sarai comes up with a plan: Hagar can serve as surrogate. Sarai’s goal is…
The final chapters of Isaiah are a letdown. From chapter 40 on, Isaiah has given a brilliant portrait of the coming redemption, a return from exile. Yahweh will return to His people. His Servant will bring justice to the nations. Gentile kings - Cyrus especially - will build Yahweh’s house.…
In his Criticism of Heaven , Roland Boer lays out a taxonomy of how Marxism has related to the Bible. There are three categories: biblical Marxism, Catholic Marxism, and the “Protestant turn.” In the first category are Marxists like Ernst Block and Walter Benjamin who interact with Christianity primarily by…
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