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Art

The Second Word V: On Images and Art, Part 3

The Failure of the Church Yet a third factor played an important role in this historical development, in addition to the imperial adoption of icons and the rise of the icons of the holy man. Brown writes: "The great Christian basilicas of the previous centuries tended to stand empty, except…

by James B. JordanSeptember 4, 1998
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Biblical Horizons

Patriarchal Dominion

The three large patriarchal narratives of Genesis concern the three aspects of the cosmos: matter, space, and time. Over these three is man given dominion. Lucifer was originally appointed to train man in this dominion, but he chose to lead man into rebellion instead. Thus, the Angel of Yahweh replaced…

by James B. JordanAugust 4, 1998
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Biblical Horizons

The Case Against Western Civilization, Part 6

Part 6: Living in a Dying World (continued) The "Trivium" (continued) The five stages of education are simply the five stages of the covenant as God administers it in human life and history, and in the liturgy of covenant renewal: First, God announces Himself. "I am Yahweh Your God." He…

by James B. JordanAugust 4, 1998
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Biblical Studies

Re-creation in the Ascension Offering

The following essay is tentative and exploratory, offered for your consideration. It seems to me that the ritual of the Ascension Offering (incorrectly translated as Burnt Offering) of Leviticus 1 is a symbolic recapitulation of Genesis 1, which thereby portrays the sacrificial ritual as way of moving from a fallen…

by James B. JordanJuly 4, 1998
Biblical Horizons

The Framework Hypothesis: A Gnostic Heresy

Just as the vast majority of evangelical Christians in America today are Arminian and Baptist, so the vast majority do not believe in a creation around 4000 BC. I don’t expect any of these three situations to change anytime soon. Powerful presuppositions are at work in all three instances, along…

by James B. JordanJuly 4, 1998
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Art

The Second Word V: On Images and Art, Part 2

The Iconoclastic Controversy Continuing Pagan Influence How did images creep in? To begin with, there was in the post-Constantinian Church a concerted effort on the part of the semi-pagans to interpret Christianity in essentially pantheistic terms. The heretics put God and man on a continuum of "being," so that God…

by James B. JordanJuly 4, 1998

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Eucharistic exhortation

John 13:1: Now before the Feast of the Passover, Jesus knowing that His hour had come that He would depart out of this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end. John introduces the final scenes of Jesus and…

November 11, 2007

Exhortation

Paul urges us to rejoice in the midst of tribulations and sufferings, not because sufferings and tribulations are good in themselves, but because of the fruit they produce. Tribulation, he says, produces perseverance, proven character, and a hope that does not disappoint. Everyone suffers, but not everyone produces these fruits.…

November 11, 2007

Unread books

Jay McInerny reviews First Chapter: How to Talk About Books You Haven’t Read by Pierre Bayard in the NYT. He says in part: “Bayard’s hero in this enterprise is the librarian in Robert Musil’s ‘Man Without Qualities’ (a book I seem to recall having read halfway through, and Bayard claims…

November 10, 2007

Vestiges of Perichoresis

FCN Hicks offers this wonderful summary of human perichoresis: “The ordinary man is apt to say that, for him, the idea of ‘mutual indwelling’ is unreal, a thing, perhaps for ‘saints,’ or of exceptionally religious people, but without meaning in the ordinary experience of the world. Yet, as so often…

November 9, 2007

Hooray for Hollywood

Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials (HDM) trilogy truly deserves all the epithets hurled at it, and Christians are gearing up for the December release of the film version of The Golden Compass , the first book in the trilogy. We needn’t worry. Hollywood is working its magic. Chris Weitz, the…

November 9, 2007
Theology

Augustine on the web

For anyone looking for Latin texts of Augustine on the web, the most complete site I’ve been able to find is: www.augustinus.it/index2.htm. Also, check out J.J. O’Donnell’s Confessions commentary at ccat.sas.upenn.edu/jod/augustine.html.

November 9, 2007

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