When there’s a famine in the land, people leave for brighter horizons. They find food; they multiply; they get rich.It happens to Abram in Egypt, to Jacob in Haran, to Israel in Egypt. Exile agrees with Israel; they always return with children and treasures.Except Naomi. She goes to Moab . . . . Continue Reading »
The gods fight back chaos and form a universe, and set up an image to mark the boundary of their ordered realm. A god instructs a king to build a temple, who places an image of the God in the inner sanctuary. The zones of ancient cosmology - heaven, sky, earth, sea, underworld - are populated by . . . . Continue Reading »
John hears a voice behind him and turns to see the voice. First he sees lampstands (Revelation 1:10, 12). Austin Farrer (The Revelation of St. John Divine, 65) points out that the turning and the lampstands come from Zechariah 4:1-2. He explains,“Zechariah’s vision was familiar to . . . . Continue Reading »
Jesus has eyes of fire (Revelation 1:14). Eyes are organs of judgment, and to get near Jesus you have to pass through the fire.In the next phrase, Jesus is said to have feet like bronze, glowing as if “fired in a furnace” (v. 15). He has walked through the fire. As Farrer puts it (The . . . . Continue Reading »
Jesus holds seven stars (Revelation 1:16). Farrer says there can be no doubt what these stars are: They are the seven planets of the ancient solar system, which lent their names to the days of the week (Revelation of St. John Divine, 68).He elaborate: “Christ embraces [the days] in the span of . . . . Continue Reading »
John hears a voice and turns to see it (Revelation 1:10, 12). C.E. Douglas (The Last Word in Prophecy, 149-51) observes that this picks up on a rich vein of biblical phonology.Ezekiel heard a voice above the firmament, and what he saw was a human figure glowing like hot metal and a voice sending him . . . . Continue Reading »
We live in a world of novelty. Newness has never been more new, and, like the mercies of God, the new is new every morning. But a strange thing has happened on the way to a world of the never-new now. Along the way we’ve made the past more accessible than ever. The “past is no longer a . . . . Continue Reading »
Fans exert more influence on popular culture than ever before, or so it seems. Katherine Larsen and Lynn Zubernis, authors of Fangasm, aren’t buying it.Drawing on their work Devon Maloney observes that “creating a relationship in which producers give fans what they think they . . . . Continue Reading »
Christopher Elwood (The Body Broken, 75) claims that Calvin’s “instrumental” view of sacramental efficacy opens up a space for critical scrutiny:“Rather than being regarded as either sacred or secular, political and social orders, by analogy with the sacramental elements, . . . . Continue Reading »
I sketch some of the contours of sanctuary theology at the Trinity House . . . . Continue Reading »
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