Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Place names become fraught with meaning by association with people and events. The name “Wittenberg” calls to mind Luther and the Reformation for Protestants and Catholics alike. Geneva has a wider range of associations, but the Reformation Wall, with its four main statues of William Farel, John Calvin, Theodore Beza,…
“…a mystery without a solution, a horror story without savagery, a nightmare in which all the watches stop at noonday…” The Bestial Gardens of Men Then they will say to the mountains, “Fall on us!” and to the hills, “Cover us!” (Luke 23:30) The following lines by Edgar Allan Poe,…
2 Samuel 11-12, which record David’s sin with Bathsheba and its aftermath, is structured chiastically: This arrangement highlights several things about the episode. It reinforces what is obvious from even a casual reading, that the transition in the story occurs with Nathan’s confrontation of David’s sin and David’s confession. Up…
Medieval bestiaries are packed with quaintly inaccurate information about animals, birds, and other created things. Foxes and snakes are devilish critters; stags, pelicans and elephants are Christlike in their various ways. Of course, the medievals picked this up from the Bible, where bestiary observations are fairly common. “Go to the…
What do Reformational Catholicism and craft beer have in common? The question seems to beg for a punchline. Better yet, it would be pretty good clickbait for an article on Katharina von Bora’s “spirited” contribution that helped spark the Protestant Reformation. Well, this is no joke and I am certainly…
Suffering Defined Suffering happens. We witness it all around us and experience it in our lives. It often comes from forces beyond our control. Suffering is inscrutable; it strikes unexpectedly, on a bright summer day or a cold winter night. We lament and are bewildered by suffering. But we are…
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At the chiastic center of John 9, the Jews interrogate the blind man’s parents, threatening them with expulsion from the synagogue if they confess Jesus. Why do the parents appear? The answer goes back to the disciples’ question at the beginning of the chapter: Jesus says the parents have not…
Several of my students have pointed to the link between John 8 and 9. Jesus declares that He is the light of the world in 8:12, but because of the opposition of the Jews and their intent to kill Him, He withdraws and hides Himself - He hides the light…
Several of my students in a Shakespeare elective have pointed to the way Shakespeare’s use of disguise and deception in comedy plays into his evangelical “lose life to find it” theme. Characters become more fully themselves by quite literally becoming other than themselves. Viola becomes Cesario, but through that otherness…
In a paper on the chiastic structure of Midsummer Night’s Dream , a student, Jason Helsel, suggests that two scenes with the mechanicals “serve as a link or portal between the city and the forest.” Nicely put; the path from the city of law and justice to the magical world…
Jesus describes a violent and tumultuous mission (Matthew 10). They Twelve will display great power, and arouse vicious opposition. They will advance the kingdom, but the violent will try to arrest the kingdom by force, by crosses and killings and exclusions. But the last words of this discourse give us…
For Jesus’ first-century disciples, estrangement from family members was a personal and social disaster. They lost their identity, their network of business and personal connections, their social and economic safety net, their prospects for future inheritance. Jesus encouraged His disciples by promising that they would receive far more than they…
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