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Over several centuries, Africa has played a pivotal role in the life and development of the Church. Through questions raised, propositions argued, and institutions established, African bishops, theologians, presbyters, and churches have contributed in diverse ways to the shaping and framing of doctrinal and theological statements for the Church. Among such contributions is their response … Read more
I offer a formal reconstruction of Jesus’ argument in response to the Pharisees who accused him of casting out demons by the power of Beelzebul, using numbered premises to exhibit the logic of his argument. This may serve as a clinic in the practice of working out the logic of Jesus’ interactions with his opponents. … Read more
This study argues that the contrast between ‘γράμμα’ and ‘πνεῦμα’ regarding the understanding of the Greek term ‘καταργέω’ in 2 Cor 3:6-7 implies how their relationship in Rom 7:6 influences the interaction of the idolatrous subject, the ‘I,’ with ‘Sin’ in Rom 7:7-25. Paul reintroduces ‘γράμμα’ from 2 Cor 3, where scholars debate Paul’s interpretation … Read more
While classical theists in the tradition of Augustine and Thomas Aquinas argue that God is good because He is simple, relational theists argue that since God is good, He cannot be simple. For the relational theists, goodness necessitates an ability of God to respond, react, or change in some way to His creatures changing needs. … Read more
While the results of the Nicaea Council were unsettling to many attendees, the next several years following the signing of its credal statement in 325 had a veneer of peaceful acceptance. During that time, Constantine (the reigning emperor), Alexander (the bishop of Alexandria), and Athanasius (his soon to be successor), labored in their own ways … Read more
Scholars have long debated the precise nature of the “sin unto death” in 1 John 5:16-17. Commentators regularly note that certain Old Testament sins led to the death penalty (see for example, Smalley, Word Biblical Commentary, 2007), but they usually dismiss these capital sins as the Old Testament context for John’s “sin unto death.” Instead, … Read more
In a time characterized by inflammatory rhetoric on social media and immediate responses to every developing news story, Christians may feel it is their obligation to be angry at injustice or injury against the innocent. Christians will often use the phrase “righteous anger” as an excuse for these outbursts, as though anger produced from godly … Read more
This paper argues that Hannah’s poem (1 Samuel 2:1–10) was an integral part of its narrative context from the original composition of 1 Samuel. While many scholars contend that the poem was inserted later in the textual history of the book, both textual criticism and literary analysis suggest otherwise. Numerous studies have noted the literary … Read more
In several of her writings, including God, Sexuality, and the Self, Sarah Coakley has argued the existence in the early Church of a distinctive approach to trinitarianism that was founded in Paul’s argument in Romans 8:9-30. This approach centered on Spirit-led prayer in which the pray-er was invited into participation in the divine life of … Read more
Taking methodological cues from Richard Hays’ important monograph, Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul (1989, 20), many interpreters have adopted Hays’ figure of metalepsis as a way of understanding how “unstated or suppressed (transumed) points of resonance” from a source text might inform the use of the OT in the NT. This paper … Read more