Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
In the 48th year, the third month, and the fourteenth night, while I slept in my bed, I was taken in vision to Xanadu and set upon a high hill. Looking to the west, I saw a large building, surrounded with gardens and fountains, walks and gravestones, and a bell…
‘Tis the season to be informed–sometimes in gentleness, often with vigor–by a variety of Christians (and others) 1 claiming that it is wrong to celebrate Christmas. I have no desire to force anyone to celebrate Christmas against their will. Indeed, it would be insulting to the high holiday to pretend…
Part 2: The Enoch Factor Back in Open Book 21 we discussed "The Enoch Factor." Because that was several years ago (May 1994) and many people have begun reading this letter since that time, we shall return to the subject here and expand what we wrote at that time. After…
Day 6. The sixth day provides the creation of land animals and of humanity. As we saw above, the second day spills over to the first half of the third day, for only at that point did God say that it was good. Similarly, it seems that the fifth day…
During the past two decades, the "quest of the historical Jesus" has entered a new phase. The first incarnation of the quest was rudely shaken by the publication of Albert Schweitzer’s classic Quest of the Historical Jesus , easily the most devastating and funniest work of New Testament scholarship ever…
At the 1997 Biblical Horizons Summer Conference, the Rev. Jeffrey Meyers presented a series of remarkable lectures on the gospel of Mark. Among his many insightful comments, he suggested that the second gospel continues where the first gospel ends; Matthew ends with Jesus saying "Go" (Matthew 28:19), and Mark’s shows…
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The blind man in John 9 passes through the waters and gets attached to Jesus, Joshua. His parents are afraid of being kicked out of the old world, the world on the other side of the water of exodus. As several students have pointed out to me, the parents are…
Contrary to some trends of modern NT scholarship, Paul and John inhabit the very same world of thought, ask the same questions, address the same problems. One hint of this: John 8 focuses attention, at turgid length, on the question of Jewish origin and identity. The Jews claim to be…
Psalm 104: All wait for the Lord, that He may give them their food in due season. What He gives them they gather in; He opens His hand, they are filled with good. Each week we come to church and gather at a table. That might seem odd way to…
Paul insisted that Christians had the right to eat meat that had been prepared in sacrificial rituals to idols. Idols are nothing, all food comes from God, and food that had been sacrificed to nothings should be received with thanksgiving like everything else. Paul also knew that some Christians disagreed.…
“They pierced my hands and my feet.” The words are the words of David, but we know that the voice is the voice of David’s Son, Jesus. They are the hands of the last Adam. The first Adam stretched out his hand to take the fruit of the tree of…
Despite his characterization of the medieval system as “Constantinian,” Yoder recognizes that “the risk of caricature is great,” and he offers this balanced assessment: “the church in the Middle Ages retained a more than vestigial consciousness of its distinctness from the world. The higher level of morality asked of the…
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