Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Summary In what follows, I will consider the “year-stamps” employed in Scripture, i.e., statements of the form, “Such-and-such an event took place in the Xth year of Y.” In the process, I will suggest some ways in which the Biblical narrative might relate to events in the extra-Biblical world, though…
In the first essay on the parable of the Prodigal Son, I suggested that the problems commentators and others encounter in interpreting Jesus three-part parable are not accidental. These are not just problems in our ignorance of cultural background. They are intentional features of the stories —stories designed to poke…
The story of the Prodigal Son is perhaps the most well-known story in the Bible. As others have observed, it may also be one of the most misunderstood. In two short essays, I will point out features of this story that are commonly neglected, aspects of Jesus’ parable that might…
The parable of Lazarus and the nameless rich man is not an independent story. It is part of a long context that begins in Luke 15:1, where Jesus is eating with tax collectors and sinners and the scribes and Pharisees grumble. In response to their hardheartedness, Jesus tells a three-part…
The Bible is written so that even when a reader cannot pick up on what might be deeper or more detailed aspects of a text, there is virtually always a message to be heard. In the ancient world, where the “reader” of Scripture would likely be a church official facing…
The distinction between garden (or vineyard) and field begins in Genesis 2. This relates to the ordering of the formless world. Plants of the field are contrasted with the garden planted by God in Genesis 2:5&8. Later on, under the Old Covenant the Israelites will be required to keep their…
Showing page 77 of 309
Showing page 9 of 43
Isaiah 49 is reassurance to Zion that Yahweh has not forgotten her. Her walls are continuously ( tamid ) before Yahweh, like the sacrifices and showbread (v. 16). And Yahweh goes beyond the assurance of His concern to promise that Zion will be surrounded by gathered people, returned exiles and…
The Hebrew of Isaiah 49:17 is beautifully symmetrical. Transliterated, it reads: miharu banayik meharsayik umacharivayik mimmek yetze’u . The endings of the six words form a neat pattern: one - u followed by four words ending with the second person singular pronomial suffix ( k ), and then another -…
The Hebrew word beten frequently means “womb” (Genesis 25:23; Number 5:22; Psalm 22:9-10; 71:6; Jeremiah 1:5). In a few instances, though, the word is used in unusual contexts. When Yahweh offers Ezekiel a scroll to eat, He orders him to eat it with his beten and to fill his “bowels”…
God has no needs. Philo, Seneca, and classic Christian theology agree on that. But I think the explanation differs. Seneca ( On Benefits (The Complete Works of Lucius Annaeus Seneca) , bk. 4) explains that “God bestows upon us very many and very great benefits, with no thought of any…
The Christian conviction that Jesus had defeated the powers and brought an end to old rites had major effects on early Christian social engagement, Gary Ferngren implies in his 2009 Medicine and Health Care in Early Christianity . “Before the advent of Christianity,” he says, “there was no concept of…
For all its reputation for iconoclasm, modernism, says Robert Alter in Canon and Creativity: Modern Writing and the Authority of Scripture (The Franz Rosenzweig Lecture Series) , is more accurately described as a “paradoxical amalgam of iconoclasm and hypertraditionalism” (p. 8). Alter’s book explores this phenomenon, along with the “double…
Showing page 854 of 2212
Your weekly digest for all things Theopolis.
