This proposal co-authored with Thomas Holsteen. In Confessions, Augustine presents two vignettes (3.2.2-4; 8.6.14-7.17) that, in important ways, parallel our interactions with social media. Both involve Augustine’s interaction and response to narratives, and both serve as smaller stories within the grand story of Confessions itself. Placing these two vignettes alongside one another sheds light on … Read more
The theological debates of the fifth century were characterized by large-scale civil unrest and mob violence. Taken alone, this phenomenon is not unique because civil unrest was a recognizable occurrence in late antiquity. However, when one considers that Christianity started as a small and persecuted movement, whose earliest leaders were often victims of mob violence, … Read more
In the fourth century, Eusebius of Caesarea described a second-century apology that was widely circulated and well-known in his day: “Aristides, a believer earnestly devoted to our religion, left… an apology for the faith addressed to Hadrian.” For centuries, the Apologia of Aristides was thought to have been lost. In 1878, Lazarist monks discovered and … Read more
An eighth century illuminated manuscript of the Gospels, the Lindisfarne Gospels is one of the oldest surviving translations of the Gospels in Old English. Eadfrith, Bishop of Lindisfarne (698-721) copied the four Gospels from Jerome’s Latin Vulgate and masterfully decorated its pages beginning in circa 710. In the 950s-960s, Aldred inserted a gloss that translated … Read more
In 2014 aerial photography revealed a submerged structure in Lake Iznik. The following year Mustafa Şahin, head of the Archaeology Department at Uludaǧ University in Bursa, began work at the site. It was immediately clear that the structure was a Christian Basilica and excavations suggested that the basilica was constructed in the fourth century. Of … Read more
Calvin R. Stapert’s warning that Christians today are the “unwitting heirs of musical thought that has its roots in secular, naturalistic Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment thought, which was unusually indifferent to—and often hostile toward—Christian thought” is still a significant contribution (2006). Stapert’s thesis is at the heart of why Clement of Alexandria’s (c.150–c.215) musical thought is … Read more
Augustine’s holistic anthropology and homiletical insights offer us guidance for preaching to today’s Christians and pagans. This paper will address two important aspects of Augustinian anthropology. These include the relationship of faith to understanding (Augustine, Epistulae 120.3; Peters, 2009) and the affections to the mind and will (Komline, 2019; Harrison, 2000). In the former, Augustine … Read more
As pneumatological and missiological conversations have developed over the past fifty years, many have looked to the logos theology of the early church fathers to develop a theology of religions that is more optimistic regarding the eternal state of the unevangelized (Pinnock, 1992; Sanders, 1992; Yong, 2003, 2019; Kärkkäinen, 2003, 2015). One of the more … Read more
Christian theology has traditionally spoken of creation as a book, a means of revelation that can be metaphorically read by human creatures for a variety of purposes. The thirteenth century theologian Bonaventure takes up this tradition, giving the book of creation a significant place in his theology. He understands revelation to be the purpose of … Read more
When we think of Syriac Christianity, Syriac-speaking theologians such as Ephrem or Jacob of Serugh usually come to mind. However, we need to remember that a central part of the curriculum for these Christians after Chalcedon were the writings of Greek-speaking authors such as Pseudo Dionysius and Gregory of Nazianzus. Gregory, for instance, was known … Read more