Peter J. Leithart

Justification is (among other things) forgiveness of sins.  Justification “justifies/frees” us from sin.  Are these two equivalent?  What would it mean to say that forgiveness is a deliverance? Forgiveness delivers from future punishment.  Forgiveness thus frees from . . . . Continue Reading »

Thomas Jay Oord’s Defining Love: A Philosophical, Scientific, and Theological Engagement is bizarre.  He draws on physical and social sciences in his effort to define love, has a chapter on love and biology and love and cosmology, talks about kenosis a good deal, and concludes with a . . . . Continue Reading »

In his recent Paul and Scripture: Studying the New Testament Use of the Old Testament , Steven Moyise suggests that Paul’s treatment of Abraham counters the “heroic” tradition concerning Abraham by equating “reckoned righteous” with “justifies the ungodly.” . . . . Continue Reading »

Writing as Paris correspondent for the  Northern Star in January 1848, Engels expressed the opinion that “Upon the whole it is, in our opinion, very fortunate that the Arabian chief [Abd-el-Kader] has been taken. The struggle of the Bedouins was a hopeless one, and though the manner . . . . Continue Reading »

Jean Baudrillard ( America ) observed that the mystery of California, its mystique and myth, are rooted in its desert setting: “The mythical power of California consists in this mixture of extreme disconnection and vertiginous mobility captured in the setting, the hyperreal scenario of . . . . Continue Reading »

One of the themes of Jenkins’s The Lost History of Christianity: The Thousand-Year Golden Age of the Church in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia—and How It Died is that Christianization is reversible: Churches die.  How to account for it? Jenkins He cites on Payne Smith, a . . . . Continue Reading »

In a 2007 article in NTS , Martinus de Boer carefully examines Paul’s argument in Galatians 4, armed with the assumption that stoicheia somehow retains its original meaning, referring to the four elements of ancient Greek physics. His conclusion is: “the phrase ta stoicheia tou kosmou . . . . Continue Reading »

In the aforementioned article, Arnold notes that “in the Greek Magical Papyri, the term stoicheia is used most commonly in connection witht he stars and/or the spirit entities, or gods, they represent.  In a related sense, stoicheia was also used to refer to the 36 astral decans that . . . . Continue Reading »

In a 1996 article in Novum Testamentum , Clinton Arnold argues that the  stoicheia (“elementary principles,” Galatians 4:3 and elsewhere) are demons.  His arguments in favor of a personal understanding of the stoicheia are strong if not entirely persuasive, but his argument . . . . Continue Reading »

Cavanaugh points out that until the middle of the 20th century, American law regarded religion as a social glue rather than a provocation to civil war.  The “social glue” view is of course widespread in sociology (from Durkheim) and anthropology. So, why is Western religion . . . . Continue Reading »