Alexander Solzhenitsyn began his 1970 Nobel lecture with a striking image, saying that we moderns hold art as a “puzzled savage” holds some newfound but obscure object, not knowing whence it came or able to dream of its higher function. We misuse it for wealth, for pleasure, for power. We use it “for all the […]
(PART THREE OF A FIVE-PART SERIES) If we can tell anything about him from the brief epistle that bears his name, Jude was not one of those people who always walks on the sunny side of life. His letter hoists the danger pennant for the Christians to whom he’s writing at the very beginning and […]
Throughout the Four Gospels, Jesus is characterized as a prophet (Matt 21:11, 45; Mark 6:1–4, 15; 8:27–28; Luke 7:15; 9:8; 13:35; 24:19; John 4:14). Jesus himself did not object to others’ claims that he is a prophet.[1] Although prophetic office was not common in the time of Jesus, in many instances he was also characterized […]
TRANSLATED BY JOHN BIRCHENSHA Johann Heinrich Alsted (1588–1638) was a professor of philosophy and theology at Herborn and, late in his life, at the University of Weissenburg. He was also a deputy to the Synod of Dort. More a compiler and codifier, his writings range very widely, including a philosophical encyclopedia and large theological treatises, […]
The word beauty refers to attractiveness, to the pleasing aspect of what is seen or heard. Its range of uses in Christian theology is potentially very broad. “How beautiful upon the mountains / are the feet of him who brings good news, / who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness” (Isa. 52:7).[1] The […]
A Song for the Lonely Alberto Anguzza is a musician, not a medical professional. Nevertheless, many identified him as a sort of hero in the early days of the global COVID-19 pandemic. While Italy was on strict lockdown, Anguzza, a trumpeter, went out onto the balcony of his apartment in Trapano, Sicily, and offered a […]
Diagnosis Modern ethics—in the broad sense of “ethics since Kant,” in the narrow sense of “the notion of ethics that people now living have absorbed,” and in whatever other meaning of the term you might care to adopt—is not doing so well. A diverse chorus of witnesses (including G. K. Chesterton, Franz Kafka, Dorothy Sayers, […]
On my last visit to New York, I went to the Museum of Modern Art to see The Scream, a 36” x 28.9” drawing in pastel by Edvard Munch (1863–1944) on loan from a private collector. It is one of four versions the artist made of the famous subject: a genderless figure, standing on a […]
A Peculiar Orthodoxy: Reflections on Theology and the ArtsBy Jeremy S. BegbieBaker Academic, 2018224 pages (hardcover), $33.00 In our increasingly secular age, we have all but divorced the arts from theological consideration. It wasn’t long ago that many of the most famous artists in the West were inspired to create out of adoration and exploration […]
JackBy Marilynne RobinsonFarrar, Straus and Giroux, 2020309 pages (hardcover), $27.00 “Ah, look at all the lonely people.” These opening lyrics to the Beatles’ 1966 song “Eleanor Rigby” came to me while reading Jack, the latest book in Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead series. This is probably because the title character is so lonely. In fact, all the […]
On Theology: Herman Bavinck’s Academic OrationsBruce R. Pass, editor and translatorBrill, 2020186 pages (hardcover), $119.00 On Theology: Herman Bavinck’s Academic Orations is a curated selection of four speeches by Herman Bavinck, translated and edited by Bruce Pass. Pass, presently a lecturer in Christian thought and history at Brisbane School of Theology in Australia, completed his […]
Oxford Handbook of Reformed TheologyEdited by Michael Allen and Scott R. SwainOxford: Oxford University Press, 2020688 pages (hardcover), $145.00 Reformed theology is catholic Protestantism, and catholic Protestantism is Reformed theology. The volume before me serves as a summarized introduction to the question, what is Reformed theology? It provides something of its genesis in the sixteenth […]
