Friday Flurry

Last updated on: August 24, 2017 at 7:45 pm By Peter Leithart

Patristic Inerrancy? John Woodbridge contests the widespread notion that Fundamentalists invented the inerrancy of Scripture, that it’s a peculiarly post-Cartesian development. He assembles an impressive array of witnesses, including these two quotations from Augustine: “It seems to me that the most disastrous consequences must follow upon our believing that anything false is found in the sacred books: that is to say that the men by whom the Scripture has been given to us, and committed to writing, did put down... Read more

Political Violence and Moral Equivalence

Last updated on: August 30, 2017 at 6:32 pm By Peter Leithart

President Trump garbled the message, but he was right. There was violence on both sides during the horrific events in Charlottesville. Read more

Worship Is For You

Last updated on: August 28, 2017 at 9:31 pm By Peter Leithart

It is often said that we come to worship to give and not to receive. That is a dangerous half-truth. Read more

Manasseh’s Turn

Last updated on: August 23, 2017 at 4:20 pm By Peter Leithart

When he became king at the age of twelve, Manasseh of Judah “turned,” “built,” “raised” altars, prostrated himself, and engaged in liturgical service (2 Chronicles 33:3). It looks like a promising sequence of actions, what all the good kings of Judah did. But the quality of Manasseh’s reign turns on the direction of his “turn” (Heb. shuv). The word is often used of repentance, but here it refers to Manasseh’s “repentance” from the ways of his father, Hezekiah. He builds... Read more

Eternal Creator?

Last updated on: August 21, 2017 at 10:51 pm By Peter Leithart

James Dolezal (All That Is In God) spends a chapter defending the claim that God is eternal Creator. In the course of this discussion, he interacts with Scott Oliphint’s view that God takes on “properties that he otherwise would not have had” when he related to “something ad extra to which he was not related before,” that is, to creation (quoted from Oliphint, 95). Dolezal summarizes Oliphint’s point: “By ‘covenantal character,’ Oliphint means a mode of being God has taken on... Read more

Against Theology

Last updated on: August 25, 2017 at 7:31 pm By Peter Leithart

The Bible never mentions theology. It does not preach theology, nor does it encourage us to preach theology. Read more

Subsistent relations

Last updated on: September 6, 2017 at 10:39 pm By Peter Leithart

Thomas Aquinas explained the Triune Persons as subsistent relations: “As to essence, the Father is in the Son because the Father is his essence and he shares it with the Son without any change taking place in himself” (ST I, 42). Stephen Long explains Thomas’s claim that Father, Son and Spirit are “subsistent relations” this way: “It means that God is not like us, for we are not constituted entirely by our relations. No matter how much I seek... Read more

Moving Day

Last updated on: August 21, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

For the past five years, I have blogged here at First Things. I was surprised and grateful when Matt Schmitz first offered me this prominent venue, and I remain humbled at the privilege and the astonishing freedom I’ve had to write and publish to my heart’s content. A huge thank-you to Rusty Reno, Matt, the FT tech team, and others who have had a role in making this blog what it is. On August ??, though, I’m moving my blog to... Read more

Friday Flurry

Last updated on: August 17, 2017 at 9:08 pm By Peter Leithart

Every Friday, I compile snippets into a potpourri of musings and mutterings, served up in a Friday Flurry (not available at DQ). God made us to be knowers. We long to know. Esther Meek argues (Longing to Know) that the frustration of this desire is one of the effects of skepticism and relativism: “To be human is to make sense of experience. There are voices today that would discourage the attempt. They say, You can’t really get it right, you can’t really understand. All... Read more

Against Christianity

Last updated on: August 16, 2017 at 11:22 pm By Peter Leithart

The following is an extract from chapter 1 of my Against Christianity (Canon Press, 2003). You can get a 30% discount on the book by entering LEITREADER during checkout at www.canonpress.com/AgainstChristianity 1 The Bible never mentions Christianity. It does not preach Christianity, nor does it encourage us to preach Christianity. Paul did not preach Christianity, nor did any of the other apostles. During centuries when the church was strong and vibrant, she did not preach Christianity either. Christianity, like Judaism and... Read more