Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
John the Baptist says, “I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me . . . will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire (Mt. 3:11).” Much debate surrounds the nature of this statement and what exactly it prophesies. Sacramental, baptistic, and charismatic Christians…
First Corinthians is not considered one of the Pastoral Epistles, but there is much to learn from Paul about pastoring a congregation by the way he writes to the Corinthians. Briefly, 1 Corinthians is an exposition of the cross and resurrection. In the first fourteen chapters, Paul gives an exposition…
Fredrik Hagglund ( Isaiah 53 in the Light of Homecoming After Exile (Forschungen Zum Alten Testament) ) argues against the common notion that Isaiah 53 is about the atoning suffering of Yahweh’s Servant. The Servant’s suffering is vicarious (i.e., he suffers for the sins of others) but it is not…
With the inheritance of Canaan and the dividing up of this priestly territory among the tribes, Israel became a microcosm of the nations of the world. This division between Israel and the nations as a substitutionary “land and sea” would prevent another global rebellion, and thus another global judgment. ((For…
One of the more revealing aspects of Paul and James’ soteriology is the different ways they both use Genesis 15:6 (“And Abraham believed God and it was counted for him as righteousness,”) as a proof text to defend their comments about the gospel. The key observation to make is that…
The disintegration of the EU is not the end of the world. It is a sign that the end of the world is anything but nigh. Western culture as we know it is dying at the hands of usurpers, traitors and prodigals. Even the worst rulers throughout Christian history at…
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A web summary of Lacan’s negative account of desire says, “In constructing our fantasy-version of reality, we establish coordinates for our desire; we situate both ourselves and our object of desire, as well as the relation between. As Slavoj Zizek puts it, ’ through fantasy, we learn how to desire’…
“I am my beloved’s, and his desire is for me,” says the bride in the Song of Songs (7:10). “Desire” is the same word used in Genesis 3:16 and 4:7, both of which describe a desire for authority, domination, rule, a threatening desire.  The bridegroom of the Song reverses the…
We’re all deists.  The design of the universe shows that a Great Intelligent Something is responsible for it. No, says Athanasius.  The design of the universe is the impress of eternal wisdom on the creation.  The cunning of creation doesn’t manifest “God,” but eternal creative Wisdom, the eternal Word, whose…
Thomas writes that “to signify something by words or merely by the construction of images . . . yields nothing but the literal sense” and “poetic images refer to something other than themselves only so as to signify them; and so a signification of that sort goes no way beyond…
Denys Turner notes that the Song of Songs presented challenges to the “minority” of medieval theologians who argued for a more rigorous grounding of spiritual in literal senses.  For these, the text speaks literally, referring to specific events; and these events, as Thomas says, providentially typify future events. To qualify…
The distinction of image and likeness has been a common one in the history of theology, East and West, and in the West at least it overlaps with the nature/grace dualism.  Image for Bonventure “denotes a kind of ‘shape,’ that is, a quantitative feature of quality or a qualitative feature…
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