Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
[This essay was originally published in 1988. Given the situation that our new national socialists are getting the world into, I thought it might be useful to reprint it here. – JBJordan] The Bible has quite a bit to say about gold, silver, and precious stones, and the Bible always…
I wrote this elsewhere and was encouraged to put it here. It is a comment on what a pastor is. Today, this is not very well understood, and God’s people suffer because of it. There are four professions: medicine, education, law, and religion. Each of these, when done at a…
James Jordan recently pointed out in private conversation how appropriate it is, in John’s Gospel, that Nicodemus is present both to ask Jesus about being born again, and to see Jesus re-enter the womb of the mother. Nicodemus rhetorically asks, “How can a man be born when he is old?…
This is a problematic and much discussed passage. I’ve been discussing it in another forum, and have decided to move it here and present some very preliminary observations about it. One large question is this: Who is the speaker here and what is his situation? Traditionally, the speaker is seen…
1. The current issue of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction includes a good fantasy novella by John C. Wright, who since his conversion has been writing Christianly. This is a fine fantasy with nods to C. S. Lewis and Antoine de Saint-Exupery, and probably Gene Wolfe as well.…
“It is an experience of our days that the spoken name of Jesus alone exercises an unforeseen power; and the effort which it cost to speak this name is perhaps connected to some faint apprehension of the power which is inherent within it. Wherever the name of Jesus Christ is…
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PROVERBS 25:27 Like Genesis 1-2, this section of Proverbs 25 establishes a rhythm of “good” and then declares something “not good.” “Good” it is to live in the corner of the roof, and “good” news refreshes the soul; but it is “not good” to eat too much honey. Chapters 24-25…
Geza Alfoldy concludes his Social History of Rome with suggestive comments about the relation of Christianity and the fall of the empire. The problem was not that Christianity undermined patriotism; it didn’t. Rather, “The role of Christianity in the collapse of the Roman system of power resulted from the fact…
Isaiah tells a tale of a vineyard (5:1-7), and then issues a series of woes (5:8-23) that culminates in a warning that a nation is going to be summoned to Judah (5:24-30). Jesus follows the same sequence: Parables of the vineyard in chapters 20-21 are followed by woes (ch. 23)…
PROVERBS 25:23 This verse gives us a translation issue in the first line. The NASB translates the line “The north wind brings forth rain,” but the KJV says that the north wind “drives away rain.” The verb in question has a range of applications and uses, but the basic idea…
Barton again: “The Romans’ expectations of the brave gladiator were identical to their expections of the sacrificial victim: the victim in a Roman sacrifice was led to the altar by a slack rope, in order that it might not seem to be dragged by force. Any show of resistance on…
From a 1989 article by CA Barton on gladiatorial games in Rome: When a gladiator entered the arena, “he took a frightful oath, the sacramentum gladiatorim ; he swore to endure being burned, bound, beaten, and slain by the sword . . . . He foreswore all that might ameliorate…
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