Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Peter Leithart recently wrote on his blog about the verse from Revelation 13, "Who is able to wage war with the beast?" and I could hardly help but take special notice. These were exactly the words l had had echoing about in my own head recently. Of course the answer…
I confess to mixed feelings about Jon Stewart. There’s a great deal about his work that I don’t particularly like. I don’t like his profanity, the worst of which is mercifully bleeped out before it makes it onto the YouTube clips that are my main source of snippets. I certainly…
The Marriage Pledge , authored by Ephraim Radner and Christopher Seitz and unveiled by First Things editor R. R. Reno, argues that the time has come for Christian pastors to rend themselves away from civil marriage. The Pledge argues that the fact that many states are now allowing same sex…
Psalm 28 has an overall rhetorical structure that looks like this: lines 1-16, prayer to Yahweh lines 17-20, talk about the wicked lines 21-27, talk about Yahweh (center of psalm) lines 28-29, talk about the anointed people lines 30-33, prayer to Yahweh As is so often the case, the enemies…
A river arises in Eden, flows through the sanctuary-garden, and waters the world downstream. A spring springs up from beneath the throne of God in the temple, rushes over the threshold, and then out to the land, toward the Sea of Salt, where it empties and turns brackish water sweet.…
On Wednesday evening, November 19, Justin Holcomb, Canon for Vocations in the Episcopal Diocese of South Florida and co-founder of REST (Real Escape from the Sex Trade) was a guest of the Theopolis Institute for a lecture on sex trafficking, given at Covenant Presbyterian Church, Birmingham. Dr. Holcomb's lecture began…
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Yahweh’s name is His name is supposed to be continuously ( tamid ) praised, but it is blasphemed (or “provoked”) continuously ( tamid ; Isaiah 52:5). Yahweh continues: “Therefore My people shall know My name” (v. 6). How “therefore”? How will Israel know Yahweh’s blasphemed name? The answer is found…
Yahweh calls Zion to shake off her dust (Isaiah 52:2). Dust is the place of mourning; Zion sits in dust and ashes. Adam was made from dust, and in death returned to dust; dust is the grave, and Zion is a new Eve, called out of the grave to rise…
Yahweh calls Zion from her sleep and excitedly orders her to get dressed (Isaiah 52:1). Like the call to “Awake! Awake!” the order to put on clothes is doubled: Clothe yourself with strength, Zion. Clothe yourself in garments of beauty, Jerusalem. Two observations: First, the call to be clothed in…
Arendt has some sharp observations on the dangers of bureaucratization in On Violence (81): “Bureaucracy is the form of government in which everybody is deprived of political freedom, of the power to act; for the rule by Nobody is not no-rule, and here all are equally powerless we have a…
Is it fitting for Jesus, who died so ignominiously, to be buried in splendor? Thomas has various answers to that question ( ST III, 51, 2), but I think the best answers are inherent to the literary structure and themes of the gospel, especially John. Matthew tells us that Joseph…
The notion that death can be life-giving doesn’t appear to make philosophical sense, Thomas notes ( ST III, 50, 6). Death is a privation of life, and a privation doesn’t have power to act. Therefore, no death, including Christ’s, has power to give life. Thomas admits that Christ’s death (as…
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