Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
The Blessing of the Father The narrative of the Exodus makes it clear that Yahweh is Israel’s Father. Moses is told to declare to Pharaoh that “Israel is my firstborn son, and I say to you, ‘Let my son go that he may serve me’” (Exodus 4:22-23). In contrast to…
When reading the Old Testament, the believer faces two dilemmas. First, there is a seemingly sharp discontinuity between the universal proclamation of the gospel to the whole earth and God’s singling out of the nation of Israel. Second, the New Testament says of Jesus that “there is no other name…
John 17 contains the longest prayer that we have from Jesus, and it shows us the intimate relationship between the Father and the Son in a way that few passages do. The prayer lays out the chiastic pattern noted by Athanasius (God became man so that man could become God),…
The following meditation on the incarnation is paraphrased and quoted from Karl Barth, The Doctrine of Reconciliation (Church Dogmatics, Vol. 4, Part 1) , pp. 185ff. In the incarnation, the eternal Son of God makes His way into a far country, and takes on the form of a servant. “But…
Peter says "baptism saves you" (1 Peter 3:21). Does the New Testament teach that "baptism justifies you"? I think the answer is Yes. That's a controversial answer, and demands some defense and explanation, but first some critical qualifications. No New Testament text states "baptism justifies you," so my argument will…
In his THI article “ Son of David, Son of Abraham ,” Peter Leithart notes that Matthew's genealogy “contains a summary of redemptive history.” This statement is only too true and one that deserves further elucidation. Biblos genese ō s. The first two words of Matthew's Gospel are usually translated…
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Noemie Emery gives a 14-point analysis of what Palin does for McCain over on the Weekly Standard web site. Number 14 is: “Counter-intuitively, makes the issue of Obama’s light resume more potent than ever. Her lack of experience is no more than his is. And he’s—to use a term from…
What is needed in biblical studies is something analogous to the classicism of French scholars like Vernant, Detienne, Vidal-Naquet, and their followers. They were carefully attentive to the literary riches of classical texts, but were at the same time anthropologists and cultural historians. I see a few moves in this…
After explaining the intrusive gaze of the Roman censor, Shardi asks whether the Romans created an ancient predecessor of Bentham’s panopticon, made famous by Foucault. She recognizes the analogies, but says that the “differences are perhaps more striking than the similarities.” First, in contrast to Bentham’s circular prison, the Roman…
Shadi Bartsch ( Mirror of the Self ) notes that the Romans sometimes regarded the wax death masks of their ancestor ( imagines ) to be their judges: “In his oration Pro Murena , for example, Cicero, as he tried to move the jurors to acquit a newly minted Roman…
Cicero advised his brother, “Take care to employ on every day men of every rank and order and age. For one can conjecture from those very numbers how much strength and opportunity you will have in the assembly . . . . A daily throng to lead you down to…
Medieval legends about Judas appear throughout Europe in many different languages. The standard story is remarkably similar to the story of Oedipus. As summarized by Paull Franklin Baum, the medieval Judas story normally was this: “Judas . . . was the son of Jewish parents living at Jerusalem: his father’s…
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