Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
I mentioned last month ( BH 82) in my essay "Like a Dove" that Genesis 8 is a recapitulation of Genesis 1. Let me explicate that assertion here. Of course, the world after the Flood is a new creation, so we may expect a recapitulation of the first creation. It…
The book of Esther is one of the most neglected of the books of the Bible. To be sure, sermons are preached on it, and commentaries have occasionally been written on it, but almost without exception Esther has been interpreted in isolation from the rest of Biblical history, chronology, and…
Dear Mr. ______, . . . Here is how I look at the geocentricity question. Since I don’t recall what I wrote you before, I may be repeating some things. 1. The Bible does not teach it. Biblical passages used to support the idea are being misinterpreted. My original paper…
Answer 4 of the Westminster Shorter Catechism is often taken as a magnificent answer to the question, "What is God?" It reads: "God is a Spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable in his being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth." Presbyterians are fond of praising this statement, preaching on it,…
The gospels tell us that at Jesus’ baptism, the Holy Spirit descended upon Him "in bodily form like a dove" (Luke 3:22 & parallels). Biblically sensitive commentators have associated this event with three Old Testament parallels: (1) the hovering of the Spirit over the creation in Genesis 1:2; (2) the…
This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. (John 8:6) The story of the woman taken in adultery (John 7:53-8:11) has been part of the canonical Christian Bible from its earliest…
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Ratramnus, most famous for his contribution to Eucharistic theology in his debate with Radbertus, was asked by a priest, Rimbert, whether the dogheads were human. Rimbert’s interest was evangelistic: If human, dogheads should be evangelized. Seems so, Ratramnus said. They live in villages, practice farming, wear clothes, and even keep…
Everyone in the Middle Ages knew that St. Christopher was a dog head, a man’s body with a dog’s head. A Welsh poem about King Arthur told of his battle with the dogheads near Edinburgh: “By the hundred they fell” before Excalibur. But where did they live? A few said…
Reflections on a class discussion earlier today about place, our connection to the ground, and gnosticism. 1) Blood and soil are “powers” that can and have dominated human life, and caused lots of human misery. 2) Jesus overcomes those powers. We are identified by water and feast, not by blood…
Psalm 105:28-36 lists the plagues. Some of them. But not in the order they happened. Instead of the ten plagues of exodus, there are only seven (darkness, water to blood, frogs, flies/gnats, hail, locusts, firstborn). Seven strikes a chord, as does the fact that the summary begins in darkness (reversing…
Niall Ferguson nicely summarizes the critiques of empire by dividing them between critiques that focus on the effect on subject peoples and critiques that focus on the effects on the subjectors. The first critiques, which focus on the effects on the subject peoples, can take a nationalist or a Marxist…
Obvious as the answer may seem, it is a question worth asking because the word has been so overused that important distinctions are being lost. Stephen Howe writes: “Ideas about empire have . . . seemed to spread and multiply beyond all limit or control. ‘Imperialism’, as a word has…
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