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Writing

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

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Art

Glorifications Versus Debasement

Because of sin, the arts sometimes do not serve to glorify but to debase. Sinful men make their environments ugly, and create ugly art to “enhance” their ugly words. But since all men are still God’s images, no men are able to live with such ugliness all the time. Thus,…

by James B. JordanMay 25, 1994
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Art

Words and Glory

Arts and literature reviews in most evangelical Christian publications generally approach their subjects in terms of ideology. We are told whether or not the film or book is acceptable in terms of morals, sexual graphicness, and theological accuracy. While there is definitely a place for such reviews, I fear that…

by James B. JordanMay 25, 1994
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Biblical Horizons

Broadening Our View of the Trinity

We speak of God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The early Church tended to speak of Him as Father, Word, and Spirit. In this short essay, I want to suggest some other ways to think of the Trinity, ways that I have found pastorally helpful in my own life…

by James B. JordanMay 5, 1994
Biblical Studies

Thousands of Generations

I, Yahweh your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and fourth of those who hate Me, but showing lovingkindness to thousands, to those who love Me and guard My commandments (Ex. 20:5-6). The Second Word forbids acts of ceremonial…

by James B. JordanMay 5, 1994
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Biblical Chronology

The Chronology of the Pentateuch (Part 3)

8. The Table of Nations If we assume births every two years, and about 30 years between generations (cp. Gen. 11:12-24), we can come up with an approximate series of dates for the generations recorded in Genesis 10. We shall assume that all three of Noah’s sons had their firstborn…

by James B. JordanMay 5, 1994
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Biblical Studies

The Eighth Month

Zechariah’s first prophecy (Zech. 1:1-6) was delivered in the eighth month of the second year of Darius. The notation of this date serves a number of purposes. Most obviously, it relates Zechariah’s prophecies to those of Haggai. By the time Zechariah delivered his first prophecy, Haggai had already chided the…

by Peter LeithartApril 23, 1994

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Radical Penance

According to the Muslim commentator Ibn Abbas, “after the fall, Adam and Eve fasted for forty days and Adam abstained from having sex with Eve for a hundred years.”

July 13, 2007
History

Longing for myth

George Williamson argues in Longing for Myth in Germany (Chicago, 2004) that the search for a “new mythology” developed from “the postrevolutionary experience of historical rupture and religious crisis.” Nationalist writers gave a particular spin to this by calling for a “German mythology.” Originally, in the early German romantics, the…

July 13, 2007
Philosophy

Fruhromantik and postmodernism

It is widely argued today that the early German romantic movement anticipates postmodernism; the early romantics were postmoderns before their time. Frederick Beiser differs, and notes three critical differences between German romanticism and the mainstream of postmodern philosophy. First, the early romantics were Platonists “in their belief in a single…

July 13, 2007
Philosophy

Germans Against Descartes

German idealism is often seen as the completion of the subjectivization of knowledge and reality begun by Descartes. Not so, says Frederick Beiser in his massive 2002 history of German idealism (Harvard): “In fundamental respects it is more accurate to say the exact opposite: that the development of German idealism…

July 13, 2007
Philosophy

Amo, ergo sum

Jean-Luc Marion challenges the Cartesian cogito by stressing the primacy of the erotic. According to Descartes’s formula ( Ego sum res cogitans ), “it follows by omission that I am no longer supposed to love, nor to hate; or better: I am of such a sort that I have neither…

July 12, 2007
Theology

Reasonable Christianity

Barth argues that 18th-century rational theology was rooted in prior commitments to peaceable citizenship and morality. The dynamic goes something like this: Christianity is interpreted pragmatically - it’s about the transformation of human life; but it doesn’t work - human life isn’t transformed; there must therefore be something wrong with…

July 12, 2007

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