Peter J. Leithart

The Song portrays the longing of the bride for her lover, the king, Solomon.  There is an advent scene in 3:6-11, but this Solomon is elusive.  Even at the end of the Song, the bride is still urging the lover to hurry up and come to her.  A once and future Solomon, an already-not yet . . . . Continue Reading »

Wine is a sign of kingship, and so Solomon is a king of wine.  His kisses are better than wine; he is himself a source of intoxication for the bride, Israel (Song 1:2, 4). Solomon, though, is not merely a giver of wine, but in giving the wine of his love to Israel, he makes Israel into a . . . . Continue Reading »

At the right, you’ll find a link to the Amazon page for my forthcoming book on Constantine.  Take a look! . . . . Continue Reading »

As Jenkins recounts it, some Christians in the Islamic Middle East chose a path of separation, the “creation of a protected Christian reservation.”  that was tried with the creation of Lebanon after World War I, but that experiment ended in civil war and a greatly reduced Christian . . . . Continue Reading »

Kingsmill calls attention to the common imagery used by the Song of Songs and the overtly “wisdom” literature, especially Proverbs.  She makes a good case.  But the difference between the Song and the other wisdom literature is notable.  Proverbs 8:7 says, “My . . . . Continue Reading »

Jenkins again: “in 782, the Indian Buddhist missionary Prajna arrived in the Chinese imperial capital of Chang’an, but was unable to translate the Sanskrit sutras he had brought with him into either Chinese or any other familiar tongue . . . . He duly consulted the bishop named Adam . . . . . . Continue Reading »

Islam took over areas once Christian, but Christianity left its mark on the conquerors.  Jenkins writes: “No worthwhile history of Islam could omit the history of the Sufi orders, whose practices often recall the bygone world of the Christian monks.  It was the Christian monastics . . . . Continue Reading »

Philip Jenkins writes, “we need to realize that such incidents of decline and disappearance [like the decline of Christianity he recounts in his book] are quite frequent, however little they are studied or discussed.  Dechristianization is one of the least studied aspects of Christian . . . . Continue Reading »

Philip Jenkin’s earlier books turn the world upside down - south is up, north is down.  His recent The Lost History of Christianity: The Thousand-Year Golden Age of the Church in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia—and How It Died does the same for eastern ad western Christianity. . . . . Continue Reading »

By his own admission, Rick Ostrander’s Why College Matters to God: A Student’s Introduction to The Christian College Experience contains little that is new, but it is a very deft introduction to the Christian view of things (organized around the time-honored creation-fall-redemption . . . . Continue Reading »