Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
The idea of atonement is not a distinctly Christian, or even Hebraic, concept. It also makes an appearance in ancient Greek thought (among other places). The Greek tradition is by no means monolithic, so it isn’t possible to speak of a “Greek” concept of atonement. But there are certain commonalities…
As we know, there are seven deadly or capital sins. Prior to the list of the seven deadly sins there was a list of eight evil thoughts or demons. It was made by an Eastern monk, Evagrius Ponticus. When the list was transposed to the West, one evil thought was…
Paul’s letter to the Corinthians is one of those epistles in Scripture to which pastors and teachers resort to show the church everything that it shouldn’t be . There is, of course, good reason for this. The Corinthian church was filled with all sorts of problems. Personality cults (i.e., factions),…
Today is Ash Wednesday , and as many Christians of the Protestant formerly "low church" persuasion are reacquiring some of the good and ancient practices of the church, one question in particular comes to the front: to ash or not to ash? That is, while many of us are finding…
A murder of tweets. To observe Lent rightly, we have to be persuaded that we already stand in God’s favor. Ash Wednesday reminds us to number our days. It helps us gain a heart of wisdom (Psalm 90:12). We keep Easter to manifest and deepen our prior share in resurrection.…
Dale C. Allison, Jr., The New Moses: A Matthean Typology (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993). Dale Allison 1993 book is a superb case study in the New Testament's use of the Old. Though he focuses on only a single typology (Christ as a new Moses) in only a single gospel (Matthew), Allison's…
Showing page 136 of 309
Showing page 8 of 43
Allison notes the frequent ancient association of Moses with asses. According to Diodorus Siculus, “When Antiochus . . . made war against the Jews he entered the sacred shrine of the god, where only the priest is allowed to go. In it he found a stone image of a thick…
Waters also says, “Leithart also forthrightly rejects the Reformed doctrine of the imputation of Christ’s righteousness to the believer.” I don’t do that either. What I have questioned, however, is whether we have exegetical grounds for distinguishing “imputation” as an act of reckoning from “justification” as a distinct declarative act.…
In his new book on the Federal Vision, Guy Waters claims, “It appears, then, that Leithart has called into question the historic Reformed doctrine of the imputation of Adam’s sin to his posterity.” I don’t. But Waters is right to sense that I’m interested in ways of formulating the doctrine…
Allison offers a series of interesting connections between the early chapters of Gen and the early chapters of Ex: 1) Israel is “multiplying” (Ex 2:2) in the way that God commanded the human race to multiply (Gen 1:26-28), concluding, with some help from Samaritan texts, that MOses is another Adam.…
In his book on Mosaic typology in Matthew, commenting on Matt 5:1-2 in particular, Allison reviews some of the Jewish literature that suggests that Moses sat enthroned on Sinai. The idea was based on Deut 9:9, where Moses says “I remained (YASHAB) on the mountain forty days and forty nights,”…
Interpretation is, we’re often told, a matter of explaining what’s in the text. Only eisegetes talk about what’s not already there. Discussing Matthew 1:1, Dale Allison offers this, much more accurate, alternative: “The interpretation of this line can be nothing other than the unfolding of what it not stated.” More…
Showing page 1829 of 2212
Your weekly digest for all things Theopolis.
