Peter J. Leithart

At the outset of his The Unintended Reformation: How a Religious Revolution Secularized Society , Brad S. Gregory takes aim at Charles Taylor’s overly simplified portrait of the shift from the medieval “naive acknowledgment of the transcendent” to the “exclusive . . . . Continue Reading »

When Israel camped in the wilderness, they set up toilet facilities outside the camp area. The camp was holy because Yahweh walked there, and He told Israel to keep it free of uncleanness (Deuteronomy 23:12-14). The phrasing of Moses’s warning is odd: “Yahweh must not see the nakedness . . . . Continue Reading »

In a 2002 article in History of Religions , Bruce Lincoln reviews the revisionist theory of William “Oriental” Jones regarding the origins of languages and races. As much as his predecessors and contemporaries (such as Isaac Newton, whose History of Ancient Kingdoms - A Complete . . . . Continue Reading »

Stroumsa ends his pre-history of comparative religion scholarship ( A New Science: The Discovery of Religion in the Age of Reason , 160) with the observation that during the 19th century “the continuing degradation of the status of the Bible would dramatically weaken interest in the biblical . . . . Continue Reading »

A version of this post was swallowed into cyberspace and fully digested earlier today. A roughly equivalent re-posting follows. Modern concepts of civil religion arise, argues Guy Stroumsa ( A New Science: The Discovery of Religion in the Age of Reason ) from two sources: The Querelle des Rites . . . . Continue Reading »

It is common, perhaps especially among Christians, to reduce cultural history to intellectual history and to trace intellectual history by hopping from philosopher to philosopher. Hume poses problems that Kant tries to solve, and Heidegger tries to undo Descartes. Not false, but very one-sided. . . . . Continue Reading »

In Psalm 38, David first complains that the Lord is attacking Him with arrows and blows from His hand (vv. 1-2), acknowledges the weight of his sin (vv. 3-4), then recounts his physical suffering (vv. 5-10) and the way his sufferings cause his friends and companions to recoil (vv. 11) and his . . . . Continue Reading »

Edwards emphasizes that faith must do in order to be faith at all in this arresting formulation ( The Miscellanies, 833-1152 , #856): “The acts of holy Christian practice do as much belong to the acceptance of Christ as the outward act of a beggar, in putting forth his hand, and outwardly . . . . Continue Reading »

Jesus’ numerous predictions concerning the coming destruction of Jerusalem, Edwards says ( The Miscellanies, 1153-1360 , #1316) demonstrate that Jesus is a prophet. Plus, in prophesying the end of Jerusalem, Jesus was also prophesying the end of the old order of worship and priesthood, and . . . . Continue Reading »

Edwards speculates ( The Miscellanies, 1153-1360 , #1236) that the dispersion of the Jews was so massive that it sent Jews all the way to China: “It is probable that some of the Israelites that had been carried into captivity penetrated as far as China, long before the Christian era; because . . . . Continue Reading »