Constantine styled himself, at times, as a new Augustus. Later Christian rulers modeled themselves and their propaganda after Constantine. In an essay in Modern Perspectives in Western Art History: An Anthology of 20th-century Writings on the Visual Arts , Richard Krautheimer comments on the . . . . Continue Reading »
Jotham’s parable in Judges 9 compares men with plants. Fruitful trees and plants represent productive men who don’t have time to seek power and “wave over the trees.” Abimelech is a thorn bush, who has all the time in the world since he produces nothing. Each of the trees . . . . Continue Reading »
God’s authority empowers. Does ours? . . . . Continue Reading »
Chee-Chiew Lee gives us a closely argued, balanced and careful treatment of the relation between justification and the Spirit in his The Blessing of Abraham, the Spirit, and Justification in Galatians: Their Relationship and Significance for Understanding Paul’s Theology . There’s a . . . . Continue Reading »
A few perhaps surprising gleanings from Jonathan Edwards’s comments on Romans, illustrative of the OPP, the Old Perspective on Paul. All from David Lovi and Benjamin Westerhoff, The Power of God: A Jonathan Edwards Commentary on the Book of Romans . Edwards recognizes, as Calvin did, that the . . . . Continue Reading »
Isaiah 57:7 contains a neat and tiny theory of sacrifice. It’s set up in a parallel structure: A. On a mountain high and lifted up B. You set your bed A’. Even there B’. you ascended to sacrifice. Or a little chiasm: A. On a mountain high and lifted up B. You set your bet . . . . Continue Reading »
Isaiah (or Yahweh) issues an ironic invitation to “draw near” (57:3). It’s an invitation to liturgical approach ( qarab , regularly used in Exodus and Leviticus), immediately undercut by the identification of Israel as “sons of the diviner, seed of adulteress and . . . . Continue Reading »
Isaiah 57:1 is a convoluted sentence in Hebrew, beginning and ending with the same word ( tsadiq , “righteous one”) and stuttering all along the way. But the parallel of the first two clauses makes an essential point clear: A. The righteous one perishes B. And there is no man unto heart . . . . Continue Reading »
Paul employs patronage terminology with some frequency, and in 1 Corinthians he employs it mainly to secure his position against rivals for patronage of the Corinthian church. So argues Joshua Rice in Paul and Patronage: The Dynamics of Power in 1 Corinthians . Paul names himself father in 4:15, . . . . Continue Reading »
In his recently published Paul and the Synagogue: Romans and the Isaiah Targum , Delio DelRio attempts to explain the force of Paul’s unique phrase “obedience of faith” (Romans 1:5). He explores the use that Paul makes of Isaiah, and the interpretation of the prophecy found in the . . . . Continue Reading »
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