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Writing

Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.

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Art

Toward a Biblical Definition of Obscenity

My copy of Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary (1976: not so new, really) defines obscene as (1) "disgusting to the senses; repulsive" and (2) "abhorrent to morality or virtue; specif: designed to incite lust or depravity." Definitions such as this serve a useful purpose only when there is agreement on what…

by Peter LeithartMay 30, 1991
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Biblical Studies

The Abomination of Desolation, Part 1

An Overview Here begins a series of studies in the Abomination of Desolation, or Desolating Sacrilege. This month and next I shall set out an overview of what I regard as the best interpretation of the phenomenon. Later essays will look at it in more detail. (The original form of…

by James B. JordanMay 22, 1991
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Biblical Studies

Advice From a Sojourner, Part 12

29. There are three things that are stately in their march, Even four that are stately when they walk: 30. The lion is mighty among beasts And does not turn back before any, 31. The strutting cock, The male goat, And a king with his army around him. 32. If…

by James B. JordanMay 22, 1991
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Biblical Studies

The Chronology of Ezra & Nehemiah, Part 4

We have seen that it is likely that the Artaxerxes of Ezra-Nehemiah is the same as Darius the Great. If this solution be correct, and I think it is, possibly there is another problem in Ezra that can be resolved by it. In Ezra 4:6 we are told that "in…

by James B. JordanMay 22, 1991
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Biblical Horizons

The Weight of Being

Czech novelist Milan Kundera, though hardly a household name in the English-speaking world, has achieved a certain notoriety in America in recent years, largely on the strength of the English translation and film version of his novel, The Unbearable Lightness of Being. 1 The Unbearable Lightness of Being — the…

by Peter LeithartMay 6, 1991
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Proverbs

Advice From a Sojourner, Part 11

24. Four things are small on the earth, But they are exceedingly wise; 25. The ants are not a strong folk, But they prepare their food in the summer; 26. The coneys are not a mighty folk, Yet they make their houses in the rocks; 27. The locusts have no…

by James B. JordanApril 22, 1991

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History

Painting and landscape

Following the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, young English noblemen began traveling the continent in what became known as the Grand Tour. Along the way, the came across Italian landscape painters, and went home dreaming of turning England into little Italy. Maggie Lane writes, “The desire was awakened to create…

August 17, 2007
History

Enclosure and landscape

Most of England’s enclosure acts were passed between 1760 and 1815, and the acts transformed the British landscape. Before enclosure, yeoman farmers lived in villages, and trudged each day to their scattered strips of land to work. Before enclosure, according to Maggie Lane, “one-third of the land enclosed in England…

August 17, 2007
Literature

Dickens, mythologist

Chesterton admits that Dickens’s characters neither affect nor are affected by time or circumstances. This is, he says, because Dickens was constructing myths rather than novels: “Dickens was a mythologist rather than a novelist; he was the last of the mythologists, and perhaps the greatest. He did not always manage…

August 17, 2007

Proverbs 19:5-9

PROVERBS 19:5, 9 In this, the Proverb reiterates the threats of the Torah, which warns against false witness and false oaths (Leviticus 19:12; Deuteronomy 17:6-7). These two verses are almost identical. Both begin with “A false witness will not go unpunished,” and in the second line both use the phrase…

August 17, 2007
History

From ascribed to attributed celebrity

Rojek again: He claims that the story of celebrity over the past two centuries has been a shift from ascribed (hereditary) to attributed celebrity. Though some achieved international fame in earlier times, “they were always under strong pressures to conform to the established procedures and conventions set by the Court.”…

August 17, 2007
History

Cool

In their book, Cool Rules , Dick Pountain and David Robins define cool as “a permanent state of private rebellion,” one which “conceals its rebellion behind an ironic impassivity.”

August 17, 2007

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