Peter J. Leithart

The Stoic philosophy M. Cornelius Fronto advised Marcus Aurelius with these words: “Now imperium is a term that not only connotes power but also speech, since the exercise of imperium consists essentially of ordering and prohibiting. If he did not praise good actions, if he did not blame evil . . . . Continue Reading »

“Hades” is used in some 75 verses of the LXX, usually translating the Hebrew sheol , which is used about 65 times. But the distyribution of the usage is not even. Genesis uses sheol/hades four time, but outside of Genesis the word appears infrequently in the Pentateuch (Numbers 16; . . . . Continue Reading »

PROVERBS 30:32-33 Chapter 30 is enclosed by exhortations to humility, warnings against self-exaltation. “I am more stupid than any man, and I do not have the understanding of a man,” Agur begins (v. 2), and he ends with a warning to puffed-up fools to stop their mouths before problems . . . . Continue Reading »

The scene of restored shalom in Isaiah 11:6-8 is intricately put together. The poem breaks up into two stanzas with a 3 + 1 arrangement,. the first stanza is verse 6, which has three animal pairs, climaxing with the young child who leads: 1. Wolf and lamb 2. Leopard and kid 3. Calf, young lion, . . . . Continue Reading »

The first clause of Isaiah 11:3 is translated in various ways: “He will delight” (NASB; NIV; ESV); “He will make him of quick understand” (AV). But the verb is the verbal form of “spirit” ( ruach ) and means to breathe, blow, or, most often, to smell. Yahweh . . . . Continue Reading »

After the flood, a dove brings a branch to Noah. Then Noah’s ark rests (Heb. nuach ) on Ararat, a wandering ark come to a resting place. As his father predicted, Noah brings nuach . After the Assyrian flood, which is also a deforestation, Yahweh will make a Branch grow from the root of Jesse, . . . . Continue Reading »

Outside the historical books, and one note in Psalm 72:20, Jesse the father of David is mentioned only once - in Isaiah 11:1, 10. this is itself telling, since it indicates that the pruning that Isaiah describes goes back to the roots. It’s not simply that the Lord whittles the Davidic line . . . . Continue Reading »

Yahweh threatens to lop down the high boughs and tall trees of Israel (Isaiah 10:33-34). This could be simply the tree of Israel, or the self-exalted elites who oppress the weak. But a number of the terms have more or less direct connections with the temple. The trees that are “lifted up in . . . . Continue Reading »

Israel is a tree, and the people are branches. On Palm Sunday, the people cut branches from trees and wave them before Jesus. They are cutting themselves from the tree of Israel, and grafting in as branches of the true Israelite tree, the stump of Jesse. But that tree is going to Jerusalem to be . . . . Continue Reading »

The men of Shechem betray Abimelech, and so Abimelech attacks and burns the city to the ground. He does it by cutting a branch and carrying it to the inner chamber of the tower of Shechem. The rest of his men do the same, and they set the branches on fire, which kills a thousand of the men of . . . . Continue Reading »