Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Mrs. Marguerite Lane of Grand Rapids writes to ask if I have ever noticed a correlation between the eight beatitudes of Matthew 5 and the eight woes of Matthew 23. I confess that I have not. A glance at various commentators reveals that such a correspondence does not seem to…
1. The words of Agur, the son of Jakeh, the burden. The man declares to Ithiel, to Ithiel and Ucal: 2. Surely I am more stupid than any other man, And I do not have the understanding of a man. 3. And I have not learned wisdom, But I have…
Psalm 137 is widely regarded as one of the meanest of the imprecatory psalms. Certainly as we read it it is seems to be a song of pure vengeance. The exiles in Babylon, in grief over the judgment that Babylon has brought upon them, pray for the destruction of that…
In the Levitical law, the priests received two particular portions of each peace offering: the "wave offering" of the breast and the "heave offering" (or better, "contribution") of the right thigh. The purpose of this essay is to attempt to determine the reason why the second of these, the thigh,…
The story of Jesus’ visit, early in His ministry, to the synagogue in His home town of Nazareth is recorded for us in Luke 4:16-30. You may remember that Jesus read from Isaiah about how the Messiah would preach the gospel, care for the poor, work miracles, and bring in…
(The essay that follows concerns a rather touchy subject: how the Lord’s Supper is to be done. I am not writing to insult or offend, but to challenge. To that end I have not "held back" but have "gone ahead" and said what I think needs to be said —…
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The “new atheism” has given atheists in America a new lease on life, but there have been comparatively few studies of atheist beliefs, backgrounds, and experiences. Melanie Brewster’s compilation, Atheists in America , tries to fill that gap by presenting “voices of atheist individuals who represent a diverse array of…
At the New Republic , Anne Applebaum tries to pinpoint the genre of Hillary Clinton’s Hard Choices . Too superficial and sentimental to be a policy book, to guarded to be a memoir, too cliched to give insight into people or events, the book is best read, Applebaum argues, as…
Ancient Athens and the Renaissance are today seen as the two great peaks of Western Civilization. Renaissance thinkers would not have seen things that way. Obsessed with sources as they were, they wanted to push behind Rome to Greece and from Greece to Egypt. Those who were seeking an alternative…
After wonderful books on Bach, Handel, and the early Christian understanding of music, Calvin Stapert had added a volume on what he calls “music’s wittiest composer,” a composer full of surprises, Joseph Haydn ( Playing Before the Lord ). The book is organized biographically, and the account of his life…
As Joseph turns Egypt into a vast grain story, it’s said that he “stored grain in great abundance, like the sand of the sea, until he stopped measuring, for it was beyond measure” (Genesis 41:49). That “sand of the sea” reminds us of promises made to the patriarchs about the…
In the fourth century BC, the Greek historian Hecataeus of Abdera offered this account of ancient Egyptian history (quoted in Bernal, Black Athena , 1.109): “The natives of the land surmised that unless they removed the foreigners their troubles would never be resolved. At once, therefore, the aliens were driven…
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