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

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Biblical Horizons

On Not Yoking an Ox and an Ass Together

5. Simeon and Levi: Brothers they destroyed. They treated violently their circumcised-covenant fellows. 6. "Into their counsel let not my soul enter. Into their assembly let not my glory join. For in their anger they killed a man, And in their pleasure they hamstrung an ox. 7. Cursed is their…

by James B. JordanAugust 4, 2000
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Biblical Horizons

The Seven Edomite Kings

The fact that there is a "week" of seven kings over Edom, before we come to an eighth, hints that perhaps these have some link with the days of Genesis 1, especially as we find this list in the book of Genesis. Clearly the list of seven speaks of the…

by James B. JordanJuly 4, 2000
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Theologia

The Ethic of Eternal Schism

Remember, whatever sins are committed by those with whom you are in covenant are your sins as well. You need to fear the judgment of God if you continue to be part of this denomination. I have recently discovered that the above rationalization is floating around cyberspace to justify breaking…

by Mark HorneJune 3, 2000
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Biblical Horizons

Not Drunk As You Suppose

While Samuel’s mother Hannah prays at the tabernacle, the high priest Eli sees her lips moving silently and concludes that she is drunk (1 Samuel 1:13-14). Hannah protests that she has poured nothing into her, but is "pouring out" her soul before Yahweh; far from being giddy with wine, she…

by Peter LeithartMay 27, 2000
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Federal Vision

CREDO | Regarding Personal Justification before God

For the record: I believe that those whom God effectually calls, he also freely justifies: not by infusing righteousness into them, but by pardoning their sins, and by accounting and accepting their persons as righteous; not for anything wrought in them, or done by them, but for Christ’s sake alone;…

by Mark HorneMay 20, 2000
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Biblical Horizons

How to Chant the Psalms

Over the years, the ministry of Biblical Horizons has strongly advocated singing the psalms in worship. The Psalter is God’s hymnal, and we don’t need any prooftexts to know that as such, it should form the center of our praise to Him. To be sure, other hymns are permitted, just…

by James B. JordanJanuary 4, 2000

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God’s Body

Judaism and Christianity are often contrasted as an opposition between “ritualistic” and “nonritualistic” systems. Howard Eilberg-Schwartz ( The Savage in Judaism , 140) argues that this is a mistake. The real difference is a difference of “root metaphor.” This is partly a difference between the pastoral/agricultural setting of Israel’s imaginative…

March 27, 2014

Prophetic Liturgy

Tercio Bretanha Junker’s Prophetic Liturgy has much to commend it. Junker aims to show how the church is trained for “prophetic praxis” through the liturgy. Liturgy “should facilitate the community’s awareness of its biblical foundations, the Christian historical trajectory, a consciousness of its cultural unity, and attentiveness to the transformative…

March 27, 2014

Lord of the Lake

Stepan Trofimovich, the vain Francophone liberal in Dostoevsky’s Demons , claims to know the gospels well from reading Renan, but in fact hasn’t read the Bible itself in a long time. During an illness, he comes to see himself as the liar he is and asks Sophia to read the…

March 27, 2014

Do Guard Duty

Jesus comes like a thief to the unsuspecting, the sleepy (Revelation 3:3). That doesn’t simply mean that His coming is a surprise. It means that He comes to take. That’s what thieves do. To prevent this, the angel of the church at Sardis has to “keep” ( tereo ) or…

March 26, 2014

Dostoevsky, Kierkegaard, and the Outsider

George Pattison’s closing essay in Dostoevsky and the Christian Tradition explores the similarities between Kierkegaard and Dostoevsky. It’s been common to read both as “prophets revealing to `modern man’ the abyssal freedom, the wild frontiers and the midnight cries that threaten both the rational system-building of philosophers and social engineers…

March 26, 2014

Sermon in a Tavern

In her contribution to Dostoevsky and the Christian Tradition , Diane Thompson offers a brilliant analysis of Marmeladov’s speech to Raskolnikov at the beginning of Crime and Punishment . Everything he says is seasoned with grandiloquent references to the gospels, and especially to the Passion and last judgment narratives. He…

March 26, 2014

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