Reading Genesis with the Church

As a member of my church’s education committee, I share the duty of planning and organizing the topics and teachers for the various adult Bible classes. All adult classes work through the same biblical books, and we are used to kicking around names of potential teachers within the congregation and then assigning them to a…
RIP, Genre: The Idea Has Run Its Course

The English language borrowed the word genre from French, which was in turn derived from Latin genus. We use these words to classify things, especially art forms: “The Stray Cats play music mostly in the rockabilly genre.” I know what to listen for when I find the music videos, and I also know that my…
Reading Genesis in an Age of Science

“In the beginning,” Genesis declares, “God created the heavens and the earth.” In contrast with other origin accounts, Genesis presents a sovereign God whose speech creates a good, beautiful, and ordered world. But how does Genesis, this “primitive” text, relate to the claims of modern science? Is Genesis to be read as divinely revealed science…
Members of a Lively Tradition

As our Reformation Commentary feature nears the end of the Historical Books series, Sapientia asked Derek Cooper and Martin Lohrmann, editors of our source volume, 1-2 Samuel, 1-2 Kings, 1-2 Chronicles (published by InterVarsity in April), a few questions about working on the project. Martin Lohrmann, PhD, is Assistant Professor of Lutheran Confessions and Heritage at Wartburg Theological Seminary….
In Search of the Ancient Mind

What the authors of Scripture said, God said—right? It’s a concise way of explaining the sometimes difficult doctrine of Scriptural inspiration. The average Christian, then, can feel comfortable trusting in the Bible’s authority and get down to the business of learning from it. But Dr. John W. Hilber, one of two 2016-17 Senior Henry Fellows…
Is Interpretation Hell? | Inferno, Cantos XIV-XVI

Reading Journal Home << Previous Entry Next entry >> As I prepare this post, it’s snowing outside—cold, white flakes that put me in mind of the flaky fires of the seventh circle of Hell. Today’s post is all about such unlikely juxtapositions of image and idea and our condition of interpretation. The Defiant Soul &…