Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Theophanic revelation is historically progressive, or eschatological, in character. First of all, in Genesis 1:2, the Spirit appeared inside the creation, sent by the Father. After the creation of man, the Spirit worked and works with humanity to bring us to maturity, from Daughter to Bride to fruitful Mother. He…
On the eighth day of the rite of "filling the hand," Aaron began his service at the altar. His first offering was a "calf" (Heb. `egel ), which served as a purification offering for himself and (apparently) his household (Leviticus 9:2, 8). This is striking for a couple of reasons.…
One of the distinctive items of the high priest’s clothing was the "golden plate" inscribed with the words "Holy to Yahweh" (Exodus 28:36-38). The word translated as "plate" is tsits , which literally means "flower." The verbal and noun forms are both used in Numbers 17:8, which describes Aaron’s rod…
The square, rectangle, and cross shapes appear all over the sanctuaries God reveals in the Bible: Tabernacle, Solomon’s Temple, Ezekiel’s Temple, New Jerusalem. One thing that can be said right away about these designs, and the occasional perfect circle (the lavers), is that they do not occur in nature. They…
"For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea-monster, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth" (Matthew 12:40). Some reflections on Jonah’s Big Fish have led to the following essay. Let me…
Citing Melchizedek in Genesis 14:18-20, James Jordan has written that "the name of God in use among the nations was God Most High’" (Hebrew, `el `elyon ; in Through New Eyes , p. 176). In addition to Melchizedek, one could cite the example of Balaam, who invokes the Lord both…
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John Walton argues in The Lost World of Genesis 1 (114) that the Bible attributes to God things that we explain in “natural” terms. He concludes that attempting to divide causation between “divine” and “natural” causation is “essentially unbiblical.” But then he proposes what amounts to a slight variation of…
Yahweh warns that He is going to measure out the wages for those who defy him (Isaiah 65:6-7): A. I will repay to their bosom B. their iniquities and the iniquities of their fathers C. because they have turned-to-smoke D. on mountains D’. And on high places C’. have scorned…
The first table setting in the Bible is the table of showbread in the tabernacle, set with twelve loaves of bread (Exodus 40:4, 22-23). That tabernacle table sets the stage for subsequent table settings. When Israel questions whether Yahweh can set a table in the wilderness (Psalm 78:19), they are…
Hughes Oliphant Old is the dean of Reformed liturgical scholars, and he has crowned his career with the publication of a massive (900+ pages) study of Holy Communion in the Piety of the Reformed Churches . The title is significant: Old is interested in Eucharistic piety and practice as much…
Peter Sloterdijk opens his Art of Philosophy (9-10) with a summary of the “epistemic suspended animation” that philosophy has traditionally demanded from its practitioners: “My aim is to show why the idea that the thinking person has to be a kind of dead person on holiday is inseparable from the…
Evangelia Anagostou-Laoutides’s Eros and Ritual in Ancient Literature is a complex, footnote-stuffed delight. She examines three myths with erotic overtones - Atalanta, Daphnis, and Orpheus - summarizing the different presentations of the myths in early Greek (Hesiod, Greek drama), Hellenistic (Theocritus, Callimachus), and Roman (Virgil, Ovid, Propertius) literature. Along the…
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