Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
The Protestant-Catholic relationship has hardly been an untroubled one. And yet, the possibilities for various layers of reconciliation are better then at any time since the original schism 500 years ago. One of the symbols for the church that is used in Scripture is the church as a household (Ephesians…
Despite the layers of wiping, covering, and ransoming during the Day of Recoverings, true unity still has not been achieved. Divorce is still possible; God still might leave his people. Thus the Day of Recoverings must be repeated every year. The perpetual expression of unity between God and man in…
The events of Leviticus 16 are commonly known as “The Day of Atonement,” from the Hebrew phrase yom hakippurim, in Leviticus 23:27. However, it would be more accurate to say, “The Day of Atonements,” [i] since the word is plural. The plurality primarily relates to 16:33, which states five different…
Mary Douglas, against the common notion that primitive religious rituals were illogical and random asserts, “The analysis of ritual symbolism cannot begin until we recognize ritual as an attempt to create and maintain a particular culture … Any culture is a series of structures which comprise social forms, values, cosmology,…
Jesus holds seven stars. They are the angels of the seven churches (Revelation 1:20). For ancient readers and hearers, "seven stars" would evoke a number of associations - the seven planets, the seven stars of Ursa Major, and the seven stars that make up the Pleiades. The last makes a…
When he first arrives in Harran, at Paddan-Aram, the home of Laban his uncle, Jacob sees a well. Wells are mentioned frequently in Genesis. Twice Hagar finds a well in the wilderness (Genesis 16:14; 21:19). Philistines seize Abraham’s well (21:22-34), and Abraham’s chief servant finds a wife for Isaac at…
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When the nations bring their treasures to Zion (Isaiah 60:6), they come with camels. It’s an unusual site. The patriarchs have camels (the word is used 18x in Genesis 24 alone, 25x in Genesis). After that, camels are typically the mounts for Gentile visitors or invaders. Midianites riding camels swarm…
When Zion sees her sons and daughters returning home in the arms of the nations, she is stunned (Isaiah 60:5). Her heart trembles ( pachad ; cf. Deuteronomy 28:66-67) and grows large ( rachab ; cf. Isaiah 54:2). In short, she has a heart attack, and a flushed face to…
Romanticism is often seen as a reaction against the Enlightenment. Louis Dupre thinks that’s too simplistic ( The Quest of the Absolute: Birth and Decline of European Romanticism , 4-5). Rather, Romanticism transforms the values of the Enlightenment by turning them into a sublime. Dupre writes, “Romanticism incorporates what the…
Augustine puzzled over the mysteries of memory and forgetfulness. Where are memories “stored”? Where do they go when we forget something? You forget where you left your phone, or forget what you were going to say, and then it comes back to you. Where was it in the meantime? Forgetfulness…
In his introduction to Kierkegaard’s Kierkegaard’s Attack Upon “Christendom” 1854-1855 , Walter Lowrie suggests that Kierkegaard was “moreevidently andmore fundamentally a Catholicor perhaps it would be better to say,more consciously in revolt against Protestantism.” His evidence: “This-appears plainlyin the Instant by his insistence upon works , and by the fact…
Modernity is marked by the reduction of causes to efficient causes, and the elimination of final causation, of teleology or purpose.Final causes are not so easily eliminated, Hart argues ( The Experience of God: Being, Consciousness, Bliss , 78-9). Our experience is not “an immediate perception of phenomena - appearances,…
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