Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
This newsletter summarizes everything that has been written and argued in Biblical Chronology to date. The Bible is filled with chronological information. Some would dismiss the idea that this chronological information can and should be systematized. We have to say, however, that if the scattered information about the tri-unity of…
At the Biblical Horizons Conference on Worship and Sacrifice , held 17-21 August, 1992, we explored the meaning of the five major sacrifices in considerable depth. 1 During the last, the centrality of the male lamb (the ram) in the sacrificial system was briefly discussed. I want in this essay…
As we saw last time, Uzziah became king of Judah in the 27th year of Jeroboam II, the year A.M. 3204. He reigned for 52 years. He was basically a good and devout king, but toward the end of his life he recapitulated the fall of Adam by trying to…
We have now arrived at the reign of Jeroboam II. When Jeroboam II came to the throne of Northern Israel, Amaziah was reigning in Judah. After the death of Amaziah, there was an interregnum of eleven years, during which Judah was governed by Israel. During those years, the son of…
Several years ago I wrote an essay, “Theses on Paedocommunion,” in which I argued that allowing all baptized and non-excommunicated persons to the table of the Lord was Biblical and desirable. (A copy of this essay is available for a donation from Biblical Horizons .) During the past several years…
The question of whether the Church stands “against” culture, is “of” or “above” culture, or seeks to “transform” culture cannot be answered in abstraction from a particular cultural context. To be sure, in many ways the Church’s message and relation to the world cannot change; the Church must, in season…
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Isaiah’s promise that strangers and foreigners will tend flocks, farm, and maintain vineyards for Israel (61:5) makes it sound like the nations will do the menial work while Israel lives in cultured leisure. I suspect something else is in view. Flocks, grain, and wine are liturgical materials in the Hebrew…
The anointed Servant proclaims Jubilee - liberty to captives (Isaiah 61:1; cf. Leviticus 25:20). Jubilee gives not only freedom from debt-slavery but a return to ancestral property. Liberty takes physical form in possession of land. So Isaiah is still talking about Jubilee when he promises “double” in the land (v.…
Isaiah 61 closes with a brief song, apparently sung by the anointed Servant of verse 1. He is dressed up as a glorified Adam in a new garden that teems with righteousness and praise. The servant is vested and robed, an appropriate sequel to the anointing. That is enough to…
In his contribution to Sacrifice in Religious Experience , Tsvi Abusch observes that the center of Mesopotamian cult was not the killing or burning of an animal, nor the festive meal that often followed sacrifice. The central event was feeding the god: “Food was placed before the god and consumed…
The war in heaven (Revelation 12:7-12) looks like an even contest. On the one side stand Michael and his angels and on the other the dragon and his angels (v. 7). But the text is organized to show that the two sides are not as symmetrical as they initially seem:…
There is war in heaven (Revelation 12), and Michael casts the dragon from heaven to earth. Good thing for heaven; not so good for earth, because the dragon comes down enraged and begins to attack the mother and her children. But the dragon is eventually cast out of earth too,…
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