Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Higher critics have, for a long time, posited a Second Isaiah to account for the structural and tone differences in the book from chapter 40 on. Now, we do believe in a Second Isaiah, but believe that the form critics have generally suffered from a lack of imagination both in…
A couple of the most serious mistranslations in our Bibles are found in the book of Leviticus. The main reason these errors have gone unreformed, I believe, is because Leviticus is simply not studied often enough, so the problem has never been fully addressed. The first mistranslation is found right…
Thomas Kuhn’s book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions , is really a parenthesis inside of the larger reality of Christian history. Progress and forward movement inside of science is a footnote to the larger and more general reality of covenant renewals in both Biblical and Christian history. The fundamental mark…
James Jordan, in the June/July 1995 Biblical Horizons, wrote a very helpful essay, "The Great Hangover," the gist of which I entirely agree with. The theme of the essay was that the Church to move forward must shuck off the old husks of Hellenism, Rabbinism, and undo admiration for all…
Traditionally, the three offices in the Presbyterian churches have been teaching elder, ruling elder, and deacon. These have been associated with priest, elder, and Levite respectively. We have seen that the deacon is in fact an apprentice and assistance elder. We have also seen that Levites as well as priests…
John 7:39 interprets Jesus’ offer of living water as an offer of the Spirit to those who believe, "for," John continues, "the Spirit was not yet, because Jesus was not yet glorified." John was not making an ontological statement about the Spirit, as if the Spirit did not exist until…
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To her credit, Brigitte Kahl (in Horsley, ed., In the Shadow of Empire ) recognizes that Acts gives a fairly sympathetic portrait of Rome. In the various episodes where Paul is suspected of subverting the empire, “Acts makes every effort to draw as favorable a picture as possible,” not only…
How many sacraments does the church have? It depends, says Richard Baxter. One can define sacrament as “A solemn dedication of man to God by a vow expressed by some sacred ceremony, signifying mutually our covenant to God, and God’s reception of us and his covenant with us.” By this…
Introducing the Gospel reading from John 21 this morning, Chris Schlect pointed out that Jesus instructs Peter to take up the commission of Israel. Israel was supposed to be light to the nations, but refused; Jesus tells Peter to do what Israel failed to do. That fits with a couple…
The Pharisees often act as a group, but the gospels also speak of individual Pharisees (Luke 7; 11; Acts 5:34). Some of the Pharisees even show some deference to Jesus. No individual Sadducee is ever mentioned in the gospels. They are always a collective, a single mind, a united front.
Matthew uses the verb “put to silence” twice, both in chapter 22. The first time it describes the reaction of the man who arrives at the wedding feast without the proper clothing (v. 12), and in the second it describes the silence of the Sadducees after Jesus answers their question…
Jesus says that in denying the resurrection the Sadducees are misunderstanding the Scripture. How so? He’s saying, first of all, that they don’t even understand the Scripture they’ve quoted. Matthew makes this point very subtly. The quotation from Deuteronomy 25 says that the levirate brother is supposed to “raise up…
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